Don't Eat That!!

Happy Hump Day! Okay, really it’s gray and dreary hump day in Toledo today, but the key to making it through gray and dreary days is the inner sunshine, right? We had a nice challenge to start the day today, courtesy of our sweet Marco.

Marco turned 11 months old on May 1. It is our sincere hope that he’ll be a year old on June 1. This morning David took out his ONE pill he takes in the morning; yes I’m a little jealous of the “only one” part. He opened the bottle, took out a pill and set it on the couch arm while he closed the bottle. Even I can take a pill out and put the cap back on the bottle in less than a minute. In that brief period of time Marco jumped up on the couch and ate the pill! I was on the phone to the vet in pretty quick order.

The medication, Prilosec, is sometimes prescribed for cats and dogs but not in the amount for an adult human. The vet said we needed to ether give him a capful of hydrogen peroxide right down his throat to induce vomiting or bring him in to the hospital so they could induce vomiting. The medication wasn’t dangerous in a dosage right for his weight, but the pill he ate was about 4 or 5 times more than he’d be prescribed by his vet and we needed to get the medication out of him. (I do kinda wonder what a cat eats that gives them heartburn, but Marco will eat anything that he thinks might be edible.)

David fed him the peroxide and put him on the enclosed porch so we could monitor him and when he did throw up it would be someplace easier to clean and we’d be able to inspect to see if indeed he threw up the pill. It didn’t take long for him to throw up after swallowing the peroxide and he threw up his breakfast and green goo that was the partially dissolved pill.

I wish there was some way to get him to relate unpleasant experiences with eating things that aren’t food. He spent some time at the vet a while back and had to be given medicine and a laxative he didn’t like because he found, and ate, a piece of Styrofoam.


In the word of more pleasant news, last weekend was SEMMantics, the regional Mensa gathering that was responsible for David and me getting together in the first place! This year David was the Carnelli, a word association game, champion and I won the first place award for the cribbage tournament. I play cribbage once a year and always have to relearn the game, but having learned it before I guess I relearn well! On Sunday after nine years of meaning to but never doing it we made it for Mimosas this year. David hadn’t had a mimosa before but I recalled the first time I’d had one. It was in Toronto and I was at Sunday brunch with my parents at the CN Tower’s revolving restaurant. The waitress asked if I’d like a Mimosa when drink orders were being taken. I was 20 years old and we were in Canada; heck yeah I wanted champagne with my orange juice! Alcohol to drink with breakfast is not a common thing for me, but it’s a neat once in a while pretentious start to the day.

Since we were back in my ”old stomping grounds” we met Scotty for lunch and David indulged me with a stop at the Dunkin Donuts where I met all 3 of my closest friends to get a cup of coffee for the road and a couple donuts for us Monday morning.

Monday we had a late lunch/early dinner at Pop’s. I hadn’t seen my dad since Christmas so I was really looking forward to seeing him and Aunt Judy. Pop grilled marinated chicken and pork with zucchini, tomatoes and peppers, some with and some without Italian breadcrumb stuffing. David and I stopped at Sofo on the way out of Toledo to bring Pop a couple of his favorite baguettes and he roasted garlic on the grill to spread on it; SO GOOD!

After dinner we drove to Lansing, because Pop lives so close, and caught our first baseball game of the season. The Lansing Lugnuts beat the Fort Wayne Tin Caps 4-2 in a fairly quick game for David, me and 5 other people. There were more than 7 people in attendance, but on a chilly Monday night in the beginning of the second month of the season it was far from a packed house.

Yesterday was rest and recuperate time for me. The good news about that is as achy as I was by the time Monday night came around after spending three days in my less comfortable and less support manual chair I was less tired and achy than usual! I guess the stretching exercises and once a week therapy is doing more good than it seems like it should. Add to that back on the diet wagon and eating better again and I recover better.

Nani’s Avatar & Siggie at Gotta Pixel

Credits: Defining Me by Aprilisa Designs, coffee mugs from I Love You A Latte by 

Double Dutch Designs, signature challenge template by Aprilisa Designs

I scrapped for the first time since May1. I did my avatar and signature for May at Gotta Pixel, which is where I do most of my challenges during the month and put the squares in place for last week’s Random 2014. The folder on my desktop says “2014: That’s So Random.” It’s essentially a scrapbook diary.

Week 16

Credits: What Happened Today- 2014 by Kitten Scraps, A Work In Progress by Inspired Designs, Cat’s Love by Friendly Scrap, Beautiful On The Inside by Aprilisa Designs, I Love Donuts by Aprilisa Designs, Afternoon Tea by Booklady Designs, Everybody Talks by Wendy Tunison Designs, My Tunes by Simple Girl, word art by TLC Creations, Jelly Beans by Harper Finch, Easter Freebie by cajoline-Scrap designs,

When the year is done and I’m ready to make a cover, I’ll decide what the random title will be!

Now I need to catch up my book reviews with the book I finished while Joey was visiting the Geek Squad and get my cheer-voice ready for the game tonight. Sorry to my Red Sox fan readers, but you know there are two teams you can’t depend on me to give support on your side when Boston faces them; GO REDS!

Friendly Friday Fest

Well, we all made it through another week. Yay us!! There are a few Friday memes I have participated in or at least followed and enjoyed. Today’s post is going to include a bunch of them! I call it Friend Fest because that’s what memes are all about, getting to know a little about fellow bloggers and taking advantage of how small the world is online.

The Chronicles of Nani is my coffee shop on the Information Superhighway, where the coffee, or whatever beverage you prefer, is always made perfectly to your liking and the black forest cake is 100% calorie free. Yes, you make your coffee at home and the black forest cake is cyber-cake, but let’s not mince details! The point is it’s a neighborhood coffee shop and every regular and first time visitor is just a few characters after the http:// away.

There are a few little things to tell y’all about, but those things will be at the end. You’ll see why!

So, let’s get this Friday started!

Hilary at Feeling Beachie is our host for The Follow Friday Four Fill-In Fun. It’s easy…ish. Just fill in the blanks with thoughts from your world! I love reading everyone’s answers to see how our minds match up. Some statements are interpreted so differently. It’s fascinating!

This week’s statements:
1. Given the choice to do ___ for ____ I would pick ___
2. When I watch ________ it always makes me want to _____________.
3. When I have people over I always make _________, it always knocks ‘em dead!
4. I always feel like I accomplished something when I __________.

1. Given the choice to do something illegal for a million dollars I would pick driving the getaway car for a single Mom robbing an ATM to feed her kids. Then I could at least feel a little okay about it.

2. When I watch Spring Baseball it always makes me want to eat a hot dog and some ice cream in a mini helmet. And I have a collection of mini helmet for just that!

3. When I have people over I always make cookies, it always knocks ‘em dead! (We really don’t have people over except at Christmas)

4. I always feel like I accomplished something when I get my walker back in the car when I’m out alone.

Five Question Friday is hosted by Mama M at My Little Life, at 5crookedhalos at BlogSpot. I just LOVE that address!

1. Are you looking forward to the time change this weekend?

No! I hate daylight savings time! I grew up in Metro Detroit and now I’m pretty much due south. We’re in the Western edge of our time zone. Kids gather for the bus in the dark at the beginning of it and can you imagine being a child who is sent to bed when it’s still daylight out? I used to scream and cry because it “wasn’t bed time yet.” Add to that in the summer, it was already so late when we went to a drive-in movie that my brother and I were lucky if we got to see the whole first movie and fireworks displays don’t even start until kids are too sleepy to enjoy them.


2. Are you getting the new iPad/would you want a iPad?

I don’t really want one. I don’t really think I’d use it. I’ll probably eventually have to use a smart phone and I’m not looking forward to that. There’s too much of me in something that’s too easy to lose in my dumb phone!


3. If money was not a problem, what is the one thing you would splurge on?

I’d have out train layout with a house over it custom built with perfectly placed pegs and shelves for my mug collection, a stair lift into the basement so I can play with the train too, the basement done to David’s exact specifications for his layout, laundry on the main level of our ranch and a state of the art kitchen with a dishwasher. The 1950s kitchen was a quaint place to visit, for over 5 years, but I really want something a nice 60 years newer with the vintage in décor not vintage reality.

So, right the ONE thing would be a new house!


4. How did you and the Mr. (or Mrs.) meet?

He emailed me in an online group we were both in to invite me to a presentation he was giving at the regional Mensa gathering in Michigan. He was inviting people to make sure he had an audience on a Sunday morning. A few emails later after I gushed about his show being about trains and chat about baseball, he invited me to the Tigers-Red Sox game he had tickets for after the Gathering. It’s always been baseball and trains 2with us.


5. Summer is right around the corner. Bikini or one-piece?

Yeah… LOL

Mrs. 4444, pronounced Mrs. /Fours/ is the host of Friday Fragments at Half Past Kissin’ Time. If you don’t want to join in, you should still go check out her blog! I was drawn to her sense of humor, she’s opinionated but respectful (something I strive to be) and If Mondays are rough for you, or even if they aren’t, she’s got a post for that!

Unsolicited promo done. Let’s talk about Friday Fragments.

Do you ever get what is the exact opposite of blogger’s block, a lot of little things to say? The problem is they are a lot of little things. I am capable of going on a tangent about little things. If you follow The Chronicles of Nani, you’re probably aghast saying, “No, Nani! A tangent, really?” I once wrote 2 pages about eating a single red jelly bean in a journal assignment in high school. Cute at 15 years old and a captive audience; writing in the journal for class was graded. It’s a little over the top at 46. Friday Fragments celebrates those things that are worth telling about, but not enough to fill an entire post. Instead, we out them all in the Friday Fragments post!

So, here we go…


** Bedtime last night, this morning, was 2 AM. It was a stunningly clear and starry night and after dinner, David and I went out to see if we could see the Northern Lights which can possibly be seen in Ohio and possibly farther south right now. We parked in a couple places in the middle of farm land and studied the sky, nothin’. Of course we parked near train tracks, so we’d see some night trains even if the Aurora Borealis didn’t show itself to us. It’s supposed to be clear again tonight and we may try again.


** It’s National Breakfast Month. Who comes up with these “holidays?” Don’t get me wrong, I love the concept of making every day a holiday for one reason or another. It’s just like to thank the person who made me crave a double chocolate Dunkin Donuts donut on Twitter yesterday!


** Many doctors believe that patients who are affected by the weather suffer from psychosomatic pain and that the barometric pressure has no effect on actual pain. Many believe that the weather does have an actual affect. Last week I asked my doctor what his take on that was. He said he has too many patients who have joint issues that are worse when it’s raining including some that if it was up to them, it wouldn’t affect them, that he had to believe the weather and barometric pressure has a real affect I’m one of the patients that if it bothers me, I has to be real. :D


** I finally have almost all of my Chronicles of Nani pictures replaced after the Google+ fiasco last fall.  There are still a couple of scrapbooking promotional and freebies entries I need to locate the photos for since I didn’t archive those posts in my annual compilation of all of my blogs and my personal journals. 20 years from now, ki6ts that are no longer available and smaller reproductions of pages in my printed scrapbooks will not have been worth archiving!


** Finally, you may notice the new countdown on my sidebar. Opening Day is a National Holiday that is pretty big to me, has been for a long time. As a traditionalist baseball season starts when the ump yells “Play Ball” in Cincinnati. My tigers will play the season warm-up game before the season actually begins at 4:05 PM. The TV in this house will show both games!

A Little Bit of That – Spring 2011

I told ya I’d be back! It’s been a good baseball Mother’s day so far. So far is because the Braves are still playing, but they are ahead by 2 in the 9th. Philly still gets their last at-bat! In the day games, the Reds, Red Sox and Tigers all won,


Still Losing

In the healthy diet world, I’m just a couple pounds away from another goal-gift. I have finally started to see the scale move in the right direction again. Stress is a nasty critter for causing plateaus and even weight gain! I tried a few new things, because weight-loss counselors will tell you to first, stick with your diet even when you’re under stress or on a plateau. Second, they’ll tell you to mix things up a little, swap lunch and breakfast foods or just try something new. SO I’ve tried some somethings new!


I tried Blue Diamond’s Almond Breeze, almond milk. Oh my, that stuff I SO GOOD It’s low in fat and only 60 calories for as one-cup serving. I also don’t think I’ve ever tasted anything so good on cereal. It adds a great nutty flavor. Now, almond milk isn’t as high in protein as regular fat free milk, but almond milk is very high in Vitamin E. My neurologist told me to double my daily vitamin E, double that if I can. So, I take my Vitamin E supplement twice a day and also add almond milk, especially at breakfast on Fiber Plus cinnamon or Special K Cinnamon Pecan cereal. I need to see how it tastes on Honey Nut Cheerios! I keep track of my protein and fiber intake every day and even with switching out some of my milk with almond milk, I’m still a decent amount over the recommended minimum. I want to try the dark chocolate almond milk for an occasional treat too. It’s double the calories of plain almond milk, but it’s still less than regular chocolate milk and chocolate and almond, yum!

I’ll be getting the opportunity to check out new things in the store again now. I’m sad to say Flying Grocery, the local grocery delivery service I’ve been using, has gone out of business. As a former small business owner in a rough economy myself, I totally understand. A delivery service with current gas prices has to be difficult to maintain. The weekend of Easter, David and I went to Meijer to get some groceries. I like going to Meijer because they have a wheelchair with a shopping basket. You know, if I can’t do the walking, I at least want to exercise my arms. Well, Easter weekend when we went someone else had the wheelchair and I used one of those scooters. While I really don’t like those things, they make me feel lazy, it’s still a viable way to get the groceries bought. Accepting this means that I can shop at Kroger and Giant Eagle too and I won’t hurt so bad I can barely get the groceries in the house. Still, I’m going to miss seeing Leslie, the owner at Flying Grocery, and I know for me, my business was my baby and I was sad to have to close my doors.



Qwirkle


Last weekend, David and I went to SEMMantics, the Mensa event in Farmington Hills, Michigan, that’s responsible for us meeting. If he hadn’t been giving a talk there, he wouldn’t have asked me to come see his multimedia show and give him some professional thoughts. That email inviting me to his program is how we found out we both like trains, baseball and cats.

This year, David placed fourth in the Texas Hold Em tournament. David’s wife finished third! I SO seldom ever finish better than him at poker, I was tickled pink! We also discovered a new game! We played Qwirkle, which is a matching colors and patterns game. It’s a fantastic and addicting game! We promised ourselves we’d buy it after we got home.

There was one problem with the idea of buying Qwirkle after we got home. Why would we want another one? We bought ourselves a new game before Christmas that looked like fun, but since it was Christmastime, we put it away with the other games and well, forgot it was there. I was looking up Qwirkle to get an idea of the cost after we’d gotten home and then glanced over at our games shelves and there it was, still in its shrink wrap, the game we’d fallen in love with during the weekend. We’ve played a game of Qwirkle almost every night since discovering we already had it! Generally the games are kinda close, but I’ve only won twice. So, I need to practice! :)


Okay, time to wrap up today’s this and that. The Braves won that game while I was writing, YAY! All of my teams won today. It truly was a good baseball day!

Lots Happening This Week

Big week this week!

Rina is visiting for the week, so we’ll get to have some fun Aunt-Niece time, including inviting ourselves to Pop’s for dinner. Rina hasn’t seen her Papa in a while. Dave and the rest of the family will visit him on the 4th of July weekend, but we’ll meet them in Indiana on the 5th so she can join them on the way home. Rina just didn’t want to be this close and not see her grandfather. So, I figured if my dad was all welcome smiles when I invited myself for Fathers Day, surely, he’d be just as happy to have Rina do that. Well, I’m sure you all realize that the Indy granddaughter calling to invite herself because she misses him is an even bigger event than the daughter who is only an hour away!

We’ll be at the festivities of the annual Mensa Gathering this week and the holiday weekend. It’s in Detroit this year, which means we can save some money compared to last year in Pittsburgh. Travel, a week in a nice hotel, dinners out and needing to get a cat-sitter all add up to Pittsburgh being personally bigger and cost bigger too! The path between Michigan and us is pretty well worn anyway! Davis will be presenting an auto-industry specific train slide show at the gathering. I helped with the sound for the show, so I feel pretty included in it too!


I’m waiting for a new study-guide text for the CompTiA A+ exam. I’m going to need certification in A+ as well as Network+ to get ready for my first job in my new career! The material for A+ was generally covered in my first networking class, but this guide will be a little more exam-specific. That’s scheduled to arrive in mid-July.


In the Scrapbooking world, Darlene Haughin is back after her 6month hiatus!! I’ll be posting some stuff with her newest kit very son!! Her stores will reopen July 1!

In the mean time, you know I haven’t been without new stuff to play with! Nibbles Skribbles has a new kit that just came out yesterday that is perfect for the entire picnic, parade and fireworks pics you’ll take this coming holiday!

It’s called Purely Patriotic and if you’re celebrating the US Independence day, that’s just what it is!

I love, love, love that skyrocket! I didn’t have the right place to use it on the sample layouts, but we’ll se what I have from the coming weekend and I’m also trying to plan a fireworks game for David and me at the Mud Hens n a couple of weeks!

Here are my sample layouts to inspire you for this must-have kit!

As you can see, Purely Patriotic is perfect for patriotic celebrations and the celebration of things Americana too!

Purely Patriotic is on sale right now at Digital Scrapbooking Studio for only $2.99! There is also a complementing mini-album page set, with six brag book sized pages that will showcase a dozen of your holiday photos. Those are also 25% off at just $1.50!


Head on over to the Nibbles Skribbles store to snag this great Independence Day kit and see all of Manda’s products, available exclusively at The Studio!

Defying Murphy and Stuff

I have a little time to catch up, to breathe, but just a little, so I’ll get right to updating The Chronicles of Nani readers on what’s going on!

2 days until the reception and things are going okay. Well, they’re going okay except a few people that had to cancel on us and my back. I got a nasty knot in the lower back on the side with my bad knee Tuesday night. The pain was awful! I ended up not going to school yesterday because I just couldn't move well enough to get dressed and to the car, let alone get from the parking lot to class. Besides, sitting in a chair hurt. David brought my laptop and books up to me and I worked on the bed. I had a heating pad that when i spoke with my physical therapist later, I was told to switch to ice because heat was bad. It was good advice! Where my pain was, on a scale of 1-10, a 20 yesterday, today it's a manageable 7 or 8. I’ll spend some more time with the ice today and I figure I’ll be back to my normal self by tomorrow. My disposition is much brighter today. Yesterday, I was predicting rain for Saturday. Tori looked at me and said, “Now that’s not the Nana I know, the Nana I know is not negative.”

David says a few people canceling at the last is normal. This is my first marriage, I don't know! Even my Dad told me he might be late. Can you imagine if it had been a regular wedding? I’d be at the church looking at my watch and wondering if I was going to be walking down the aisle by myself!

Okay, truth is that when we were talking about the wedding thing, I figured I would walk down the aisle alone unless it was a big deal to Dad to do it. I have long thought that weddings and the reception events that went with them are for the guests, not the bride and groom. The marriage is for the bride and groom. That being said, my back can hurt, everyone can bail on the weekend and it can rain cats and dogs. I STILL have the dream I wanted out of the deal. It’s just that now that we’re doing the summer reception for our winter wedding, I want to enjoy it.


My First AG!

Tori and Rina have been here for a couple of weeks, We usually take them for a long weekend trip in the summer. Last year Rina went to the Railfan weekend in Altoona with us and Tori came for a yummy weekend in Hershey. This year they decided they wanted to share their weekend and both went to the Mensa AG in Pittsburgh with us. There are more teenagers at the big annual event than there are at the smaller regional gatherings and they even have a track of events especially for the “TeenSIG.” We had lots of time spent with the girls and they also had plenty of things they did on their own, so it was a great combination of aunt and uncle time with independent time too.

Rina's first Mensa event

It was my first AG, David’s too. We’d been to smaller Mensa events, but this was the first time for the big one for all of American Mensa. Yes, ALL of the eggheads in ONE omelet! After so many years of knowing each other by instant messages and email, I finally got to meet Ben, my “smart little brother,” in Pittsburgh! I also got to meet Joan Marie, a fellow member of GenX, several other groups and the M&Ms yahoo list. We talked for a while after David’s presentation of his train slides Friday Night. The presentation had a decent attendance, including two nieces and several members of TeenSIG. Just before David’s trains, Tori and I discovered “The Werewolves of the Pittsburgh Mensa AG.” Werewolves is SUCH a COOL game! The game we played was The Werewolves of Miller’s Hollow. Were were newbies, but you learn and become addicted to it quickly! There’s a link to the basic directions at the bottom of this post! Tori actually left the dance on Friday night to play more werewolves and we used our peer pressure to bring David and Rina into the addiction Saturday.

Tori making Happy Socks

On Saturday, the girls and I went to the Operation Happy Sock workshop at the AG. Operation Happy Sock makes cat toys for shelter cats. The toys are made with donated socks, fiberfill and cat nip. I’d guess the small room of Mensans talking abut their cats made over a thousand collectively in our hour together. Everyone was encouraged to take one of the toys home for their own cats and take some to donate to their local shelter.

Kaline and Baggle loved their Happy Socks! I’d done their “sock puppets” with legs from tights bundled up with just cat nip in them, but the squishy filled ones are even nicer. As much as they liked theirs, I think the shelter cats were even happier!

Our kids LOVED the Happy Socks

Tuesday afternoon, Rina, Tori and I took half of the large box of Happy Socks we brought home to Paws and Whiskers in Toledo, Ohio. Half of the Happy Socks we brought home were for a Toledo shelter and half are going with them to an Indianapolis shelter. Paws and Whiskers is a no-kill nonprofit cat shelter. In many ways, it broke my heart ot see all of those homeless cats in cages.

Paws and Whiskers is a nonprofit, No-kill cat shelter in Toledo

They had so many kittens too! David and I have been reading about pets that have been given up or even abandoned in this economy when families have lost their homes and had to move to apartments that didn’t allow pets or even the ones who just could no longer afford to feed or care for pets. We’ve been thinking that it might be time to look for a new brother of sister for our kids. We’d want to adopt an adult cat from a shelter. Cute little kittens have a much easier time finding a home than adult cats do. When we walked in to Paws and Whiskers, the woman who greeted us took a phone call where she had to say that they had no room for more cats right now. They even have adult cats that were adopted there and ended up back there a few years later because of circumstances beyond the kitty’s control.

We got to put the Happy Socks in the cages ourselves. The “house v=cat” there, who lays on a shelf near to the entrance as the shelter’s greeter, became very interested in the bags we brought! We gave her one and brought the bags to the walls of cages. They must have smelled the cat nip, because as soon as we opened the first bag, they were all meowing and poking paws out to say, “Don’t forget me!”

These kittens at Paws and Whiskers were
adopted and waiting to go to their new home

Most of the cats and kittens there were so friendly and affectionate. They did a really good job of “selling themselves.” I’d have taken them all home if I could! I had suggested foster-parenting cats, but David doesn’t like that idea. He figures he’d get too attached to the foster cats. He’s probably right. We are planning to look into some volunteer opportunities. Hey, they even have a Texas Hold ‘Em tournament with proceeds going to the shelter. David is planning on that one!

Digitalegacies Designs Reception Sale

35% OFF July 11 & 12

One last note for all the scrappers! In honor of our wedding reception weekend, I’m having a sale! If you head over to Scrap Bird on Saturday or Sunday, all and I mean ALL the products in the Digitalegacies Designs store will be 35% off!

Be sure to stop by this weekend! After Sunday when the party mood settles and I realize that exam 2 has been posted for my class, it’s back to business as usual!

How to play Werewolf
Paws and Whiskers
Operation Happy Sock

Photoblog Wednesday

Hideous hats? No way! FASHIONABLE!

Oh the irony!

Sash and me at the hideous hat contest last weekend at SEMMantics. There is something defining about brains that can actually come up with matching hideous hats! (No pre-planning possible - we just met each other last weekend!!)

Sash won, but not at all because it's a hideous hat! He made a face for the judges that tipped the scales!

Great Weekend Coming!

The week is over, YAY!!!

No, it really hasn’t been a bad week. There is just a lot going on as May gets rolling.

The biggest thing this weekend for me, is that tomorrow, May 2 will be our fourth Dativersary! Yes, we still acknowledge that. A big part of the reason we do, is it also means SEMMantics weekend, which is where we met in person after a couple weeks worth of emails. As much as I thought, “If he’s a gentleman, we’ll still go to the ball game, but he won’t call again,” I came to find out that the feeling of “spark” was real and mutual! Our first date was May 2, the day after SEMMantics in 2005 and well, David’s my husband now!

It was also our first thought for a wedding day had we gone that route. Honestly, I’m glad we didn’t. We‘d have had to miss SEMMantics!

So, this weekend is SEMMantics and we’ll get to see Mensa friends we haven’t seen in a year. As it worked out, SEMMantics was the only Mensa gathering we attended last year! This year, we already know we’ll be going to the AG, so we’ll have a long week later with our pals too!


Tomorrow is also National Scrapbooking Day. Scrap Bird is having a blowout sale, as I mentioned in the “Sale Paper” yesterday. Make sure you check out the NSD section at the store for 10 designer’s freebies! The freebies, including the collab Flowers Blooming part 2, are only guaranteed free for the weekend, May 1-3, so make sure you get over to check them out.

The song that’s playing first for the weekend is an old live tune from Nazareth, called Java Blues. David often tells me the coffee’s got me! It’s also the name of the NSD freebie kit from Digitalegacies Designs!


If you like your coffee or anyway the social implication of coffee with friends, this is a great kit for scrapping those friendly occasions!

If you don’t have coffee or “at coffee’ pics to scrap, there are other things you can scrap with this kit too!

Credits: Lay0ut by Jana with Java Blues by Digitalegacies Designs

My CT member, Jana, did this precious layout called “Bubbles,” using the coffee ring circle in the paper to make frames for pictures of her little one!


The first of May is also a new I Wanna Talk About Me challenge!

This month, we’re focusing on the ME and I want to see layouts with a picture of you and some journaling about you.

Here is the layout I did for the challenge:

Credits: Flower Blooming part 2 Collab by Scrap Bird Designers.

That’s all from Flowers Blooming part 2, so you can grab that for free this weekend too!

Be brave and join us in making the layout ALL about you this month, and you’ll get Butterfly Kisses by Digitalegacies Designs as your posting bonus


What an exciting weekend this is going to be! A Mensa gathering, and all the chocolate that goes with that, a little bit of Dativersary romance with my hubby and all kinds of fun, new stuff at Scrap Bird and all over the Scrapbooking world!

Heck, I’ll sleep on Monday!

Nani Tries Something New

I’m writing while taking a break. I wonder if Donna Reed ever had to any serious sink plunging?

I have a homeopathic drain declogger setting in the bathroom sink. It’s a strange drain that gets build up trouble often. This drain-cure is NOT the something new the post title is talking about. Actually, this is an old idea. Dad heard about it on a Mr-fix-it type radio show a few years ago and it worked wonders on my slow shower drain!

We’d tried Draino and Liquid Plumr and various commercial solutions. You spend $6-10 on a bottle that does one declogging and it doesn’t work well. Well, Mrs-fix-it to the rescue! The solution is pretty simple. Spend roughly three dollars on a large box of baking soda and a gallon of white vinegar. When the two are combined, they make a mild acid. Just pour a healthy amount of baking soda in the drain. Then pour in a cup or so of vinegar. Watch it bubble! (Hint, young kids LOVE to watch, older kids love to do it!)

If it’s a mild clog, it will eat away at it pretty quick. For more stubborn or sludgy clogs, it may take a little plunging or just leaving it in the drain until it finished eating away at it. If you need to, apply it a second time to finish the job. It clears the clog, is safe on your pipes, a mild enough acid that it won’t burn your hands and that $3-4 investment will last for about six clogs, three if they are really bad ones!

Now the “NEW”



I’ve tried some new things lately. I signed up for Facebook. I had no idea what Facebook was, but I got an invitation, from Darlene actually, and joined. It’s pretty neat. I think half the people I’ve ever worked with, a fair chunk of the digital scrapbooking world, most of Mensa and all of my relatives that are under 50 are on it! I joined yesterday afternoon and as of lunchtime, I have almost 50 friends.

I haven’t run into anyne who’s sent a shocked “you’re married??” message yet, so that means we’ve done a decnet job of telling the masses. Facebook is pretty cool. It’s like a personal and private message board/chat thing. You stop in and read at your leisure, like a message board, but things get updated in real time while you’re signed on, like a chat. Very cool.

I got an invitation to check out my cousin’s son’s motorbike racing pictures. I need to power up the translator. While he sends me messages in English, his son’s pictures are all captioned in Italian! But, hey, that’s more practice on my reading in Italian too, right? I’m looking forward to cyber-reuniting with more family and friends. I’m also going to be careful to turn it OFF on a regular basis. I can see that it could become addictive! LOL

There’s something else new on the married front. By request of family members, David and I did an after-the-fact bridal registry. I participated, but sorta under protest. I didn’t think you gave gifts for an elopement. Grandma told me some time ago that in gift-giving etiquette for weddings, you should give at least as much as would cover the cost of your dinner at the reception. Well, no reception, so in like and kind for a wedding announcement in the mail, a card, no? When we were talking about doing a wedding, I didn’t want to register either. I just feel weird about it.

But, David explained it to me as something you do for other people. It gives them a way to choose something they know you can use and it makes them feel good to give. Well, that hit home with me. I appreciate the “need” to give in times of celebration. I’m not good at controlling myself because it feels so good to do it. So, why would I make it more difficult for someone else?

So we registered a few things we keep saying we need, but don’t buy. The notable exception being the fancy-pants one cup coffee maker, which David encouraged me to say yes to putting it on the list. I think he liked the idea of limiting the cup size because he perceives that I drink too much coffee. I like the flavor variety packs that you can get for the single cup brewers. Besides, I can always brew a second cup! I was bummed, however, when I verified that our list was online. The Mike and Ikes are not available online! Everything else is, but someone ordering and having sent from online, can’t give Mike and Ikes. I wonder if Pilot gift wraps and delivers? Do they have a gift registry? Next time I stop there, I’ll have to inquire! ;)

We have to re-register for the Mike and Ikes!

I was going to take a paid post opportunity to write about a chat community for married people. I thought that might be a nice lunch idea, stop in chat about, oh, what to make for dinner, ideas on places to go things to try as a couple, you know, married stuff. I checked out the site/chat room. The “married chat had 2 people in it and no one was talking. The “naughty chat” had people in it but I was the only married one when I got there! Yeesh! I said I was writing a review of the site and asked if I could interview someone. I did talk to one guy who told me he came into that room from a completely different site. It seems this company has many portals, but the same chat rooms. I was supposed to write a review with a positive tone. I just couldn’t do that, so for 6 hours, I can’t sign up for any new opportunities wile that one runs it’s time limit course. Most of the sites you can check out before accepting the opportunity. I guess I’ve learned my lesson. If you can’t check out the site BEFORE accepting the opportunity, I probably don’t want to write about it!

So anyway, there’s the new stuff! I’m on Facebook, I need to register at Pilot if I want Mike and Ikes, don’t look for me at Married Chat. You can find me at Scrap Bird (shameless plug) Remember to PM me for your free alpha if you join and be sure to check out the challenges! I have more “Because of You” add-on kits to give away!

And now, I need to see if my drain is ready to be called unclogged!

SEMMantics Weekend & A New Kit!

The final table at the Poker Tournament
Dana (upper right) , who was also on
the winning Mensa Bowl team, won it all!

This past weekend was SEMMantics, Southeastern Michigan Mensa’s regional gathering, the one where David and I met in person. This year, the gathering started on the three-year anniversary of our first date.

It was a fun weekend! Mensa gatherings are always fun. We get to spend time with good friends that we only see a couple of times a year, try new games, see interesting speakers and poker! This year, we both played in the early Saturday morning tournament. I didn’t win, but I outlasted David!

Friday was a lot of hospitality, talking and chocolate! Melissa gave her presentation of pictures she’d take in China when she was in college. It was some great slides and informative discussion. You know when you go to something to support a friend and walk away thinking you would have missed something great if a stranger had been doing it? That was me after Melissa’s presentation. It was very cool, from the glimpse of the world of communism to the world’s largest Buddha, all of it very fascinating! (But I wouldn’t want to do the freezing miles of mountain walking for fun!)

After Melissa’s talk, I stopped at the ice cream social and brought David a sundae cone at the Euchre tournament where he was finishing up his game. I got little razzed and asked if I was taking ice cream orders, but after all, that was our Dativersary dessert!

Saturday evening was the beer tasting. I’m not a big drinker. I like my “adult beverages,” but I don’t drink them in excess or even with any regularity, but I like to take advantage of the opportunity to try new tastes! I discovered some that weren’t bad. A few that were okay, but not a beer I’d buy and even a couple that I promptly poured into the waste bucket and asked for more of the first one to get the taste out of my mouth!

We played a small buy-in cash game in the evening and I was out before David but not until after I sucked in a few chips with FOUR ACES! I looked back at my hold cards and my mouth was trembling inside as I kept the wide smile off my face until I’d finished my betting. David said he thought maybe I had an ace to go with the 2 on the table, but the whole table erupted when I showed the two aces in my hand. It felt good to hear people saying how well I played the hand. A couple of hands later, Shirley relieved me a bunch of those chips with a nut-flush. I debated for a while and finally decided she was bluffing when she went all-in. Note to self for future - Shirley doesn’t bluff!

After the closing ceremony and awards, we went with a small group to Max and Erma’s for lunch before saying goodbye and sending everyone home or back to the airport. David and I chased a few trains with the remaining daylight hours.



Yesterday was a headachy, eye itchy day. Bleh! I’d heard that the pollen was supposed to be bad this year. I felt awful when I woke up and when David came back from getting gas for the lawn mower, he said he knew why. The truck was covered in powdery yellow tree pollen! So, I deal with it. Not that I have a lot of choice! I mean, where can I live that there are no trees?

I was still stuffy and a little achy last night while David was at work. Last week was a busy week for me and I have a bunch of calls to make for the middle of this week because of it. That’s a great thing! At least, I really hope it is. But a busy week followed by a Mensa gathering weekend means little time for scrapbooking! So, I sent David off to work on the night shift and got ready for an evening of laundry, baseball and scrapbooking!

There is still more laundry to do, but I got a good start on it. The Reds finally won, although a certain someone sent me a “Red Sox Win!” text from work to rub it in. Yesterday a Red Sox win was a Tigers loss. And I got a kit done that I’d designed in my brain on Sunday.

“She Said Yes!” is the new kit from Digitalegacies. The kit shares its name with a song by Chad Brock which chronicles his meeting and engagement to his first wife. So the kit is a romantic one just begging to scrap hearts and bling! It’s also my entry for this month’s color challenge at DSO.

My sample layout features a Christmas Eve photo from when my parents were engaged.

Credits - Kit She Said Yes! by Digitalegacies, font - Lucida Handwriting.

And here is “She Said Yes!”


sorry, link is expired.

As always, I’d love to see layouts with any of my kits! In fact, very soon, there will be an incentive plan to show me some!

Send me your layouts or any questions or correspondence to chroniclesofnani@gmail.com

Spring Sparklies

Okay, I think I got a little carried away. Remember, how I said I had some commercial use items and I wanted to try to do a kit for the Stone Accents Studio color challenge? Well, I finished, but it’s not a small kit! There are 6 colors in the palette for the challenge and since I was doing simple elements, like I do for my color kits, I made each element in all 6 colors. It adds up! I started with glitter swatches and customized colors to match the palette. I think it’s a nice looking kit. It’s just bigger than I’d planned on it being!

I know I said I wasn’t thinking I would do this “pro.” Honestly, I don’t know if I’ve got what it takes as a professional designer. Would anyone want to buy the kits I’ve done or the better with experience ones I will create? I enjoy doing them and it might be something someday that I do well enough to be a supplemental income source. I guess that depends on what the job market brings and how soon. In looking at others’ kit contributions in this challenge, I think my work stands up okay, but it doesn’t stand out...yet.

While I grapple with assessing the quality of my design work, I am working on a new theme kit. It’s probably going to be another couple weeks before that’s unveiled and I’ll probably do a mini color kit for the DSO color challenge first. Having the guidelines makes me stretch what I can actually do a bit. I just don’t want to make boring kits. Like I said before, the color kits are actually harder to create than the theme kits. In the theme kits, the theme determines whether or not the kit appears to be interesting or blasé. In color kits, it’s all about what I can do to give the kit character. There’s the challenge!

Here is my sample layout with Spring Sparklies:

Precocious Cargo

Credits: Spring Sparklies by Digitalegacies, Alpha - Emma by Retrodiva Fonts - Note This, Arial

And here’s the preview!


sorry, link is expired.