I used a rub on “Live, Laugh, Love” on my pic.

This was a kit I bought from Savvy n Sassy, it included paper, ribbon & buttons. I hardly used any of the kit so I have alot of stuff left…awesome!

Click here!

I printed these invites from Kid’s Birthday Party Guide.

I bought Monster Jam party supplies from Celebrate Express because you cannot find this stuff here in Canada, well I didn’t. Fun stuff & quick shipping via UPS.

I loaded up the boxes with stuff from Celebrate Express but, also some fun goodies from the local dollar store that my son likes like Mario Pez!

The napkins, plates, blowers, cups & visors I was able to find here at Zellers.

I found a pic of this cake found here, so I just went with it, I used a foil pan because I wanted that “metal” feel (hee hee) not to mention I just threw out the pan afterwards. I made a milk chocolate cake than yummy chocolate buttercream icing, bought a new monster truck & hot wheel cars, ran the tires thru the icing & than used mini oreos around the border to act as tires, my hubby made checkered flags & I sprinkled oreo crumble on the icing for dirt. Yummy! I love how this cake turned out & it was soooo quick & easy to make.

For snacks we had bbq’d tires (hamburgers), chicken burgers, veggies & dip, pretzel rods, popcorn twists, rootbeer & sprite to drink & strawberries.

We played some fun games, jumped on the trampoline & had a tattoo station.

Overall I think the kid’s had a great time & 2 hours later I was glad to see them all go home to their parents!!!

You think I would have all this time to scrapbook or make cards…nope! not once did I pick up a stamp, paper or ink! Nada! Absolutely NOTHING!

My son started Grade 1 so he is in school all day now & I think truth be told I’m a little lost so I kept myself busy running errands!

My daughter is in Grade 4, the Queen of the school this year!

My little guy starting Grade 1!

So during the first week of school I did enjoy my quiet time, I went to the new Cross Iron Mills Mall in Balzac with a friend & we shopped happily & had lunch together. On Wednesday my daughter had her 2nd Ortho appointment just for x-rays & moulds of her teeth, than she started her theatre group. Thursday AM I pampered myself with a manicure, pedicure & waxing. Friday I met friends for latte’s, Starbuck’s has the Pumpkin Spice latte’s now, yum-o! & than it was off to a doctor’s appointment before the kid’s were out of school & than we celebrated my son’s 6th birthday with the in-laws & in between all that I can’t even remember how many times I went to the grocery store (too many!) & than I have been planning his “real” birthday party, what kind of cake to make, etc. Fun stuff! 

He was soooo excited Thursday night that we had trouble getting him to settle down, on Friday AM he woke up about 6:40AM to open presents before his Dad left for work, so it was a crazy AM to say the least, good thing I got up at 5:30AM!!! than he went to school & brought a fruit platter & chocolate chip cookies for all his class mates. Than we had the in-laws over for pizza (his choice), cake & ice cream & more present opening! with the start of school so close to his birthday we decided that we wouldn’t have his actual birthday party till next weekend. It’s going to be a Monster Jam party.

Yesterday we ended up going to Canmore, it’s soooo beautiful & peaceful there. They had a street festival going on so it was a little busy, & than a long weekend & today the highland games are there but, we managed to work our way thru the crowds than walk along the river.

Does he look terrified to you???

So on that note it’s been busy! I do plan on getting some stuff done this week, I have all these ideas swarming in my little brain! but, I do have a party to get ready for this week so I will just take it day by day & I know you all come to visit the craft related stuff & not my boring family life!

Well I hope you are all enjoying your long weekend!

We had some time to kill before going to the airport so we went to Balboa Park, this is our 2nd time to San Diego, we went when my daughter was only 4 months old & I absolutely loved Balboa Park than & I still love it, the beauty of all the museums, etc is just spectacular, I really wished we had another day so that we could have taken in everything at Balboa Park but, we ran out of time.

Bells ring from here.

These trees are stunning, lush, green…gorgeous!

All tiles.

The organ, absolutely breathtaking, organ music was playing the whole time, very majestic & HUGE. I guess they have concerts here too.

That’s my daughter standing there!

After Balboa we went & returned our rental car than headed to the airport for a 1:30PM flight home, the flight was great, the kid’s were low key so I was able to basically read the whole time, I finished reading my book last night, the 3rd in The Spa Girls series: Calm, Cool & Adjusted, this time Poppy’s story, it was fun!

It was a great day to come home because all day it was cloudy & overcast, I’m glad to be home safely, it’s always nice to come home but, we are ALL going to miss going to the beach every single day & feeling sand between our toes!

Today my awesome hubby navigated directions to 3 scrapbooking stores!!! I went to Cool Scrapbook Stuff, Paper Tales & The Stamp Addict.

Cool Scrapbook Stuff is HUGE, lotsa stuff, if you can’t find what you are looking for there I’m sure you will NEVER find it! Paper Tales was very cutesy, only carried Amuse Stamps, vintage type stuff & The Stamp Addict is loaded with stamps & very friendly staff.

I didn’t end up buying alot of stuff, I bought 3 stamps & some paper.

After we did our running around we came back to our hotel room & ate lunch than headed off to Ocean Beach again.

After the beach we came back to the room made dinner & than went to Presidio Park.

Than we came back to our room & the kid’s went swimming & I packed up most of our stuff.

Tomorrow we return home…we have had a great vacation but, I am ready to head back to all my comforts of home including my scrapbooking room.

I’m off to read now & hopefully I / We will ALL get a good night’s sleep!

We than headed back to our hotel room & went swimming & hung out at the pool for a bit than we got ready & headed off to Sea World for our 2nd day.

I love, love all the flowers all over the place here.

We got to Sea World about 3PM, we went late because we wanted to see Summer Nights, so we got thru all the stuff that we missed on Monday, we went thru the Shark Encounter again & I was able to get a couple of pics this time.

Little sharks but, don’t let them fool you, the sign says they can & will bite!

Great White Shark swimming over our heads in the tunnel.

Where to now?

My daughter getting her comic sketch done.

Touching starfish & sea urchins in the tide pools. The kid’s also got to touch stingrays & dolphins (that took time & patience).

We went to see Shamu Rocks, crowd was loud, they were playing rock music while we were waiting & everyone was stamping their feet on the bleachers, it was wild! Great show. We also went to see the Ignite show with the dolphins & it was FABULOUS!

The people in the soak zone indeed got SOAKED!!!

Saying hi!

That’s it for today! Another jam packed day but, FUN! Tomorrow is our last full day in San Diego, not sure what we will be up to but, I’m sure it will be a great day.

I’ll leave you with a pic of the Shamu VW Bug! Wouldn’t it be fun to drive around in this bug???

Night, night!

Than we went to Mission Valley Centre & went to Target there (2 floors!) but, we didn’t buy anything too exciting.

After going shopping we went to the beach in La Jolla, the beach was gorgeous again with amazing surf & the houses…ohhhhhhh!

My son & hubby checking out the surf.

My son waiting for a big wave to body surf.

Hazard of body surfing…OUCH!

Seaweed butt!!!

After spending a few hours at the beach we headed back to our hotel room & cleaned up than went to the local laundry mat & washed our clothes than we went to Von’s (Safeway) & got some groceries came back to our hotel room, ate some dinner & the kid’s went swimming.

During our stay in San Diego I am the driver & my hubby is the navigator, I don’t do maps! Well my oh my are the drivers in Southern California FAST & AGGRESSIVE!!! As soon as I get off the freeways here I breathe a sigh of release, thank my lucky stars & regain my composure!!!

Night, night…off to bed! Tomorrow we are going back to Sea World.

We got up had leftovers for breakfast than we went swimming for a bit, it was overcast so a bit to cold for me! I know I’m wimpy :} So I went back to the hotel room & got ready for our day than the kid’s came back & we all got ready, packed up all our stuff, loaded the car up, checked out of our hotel & headed to Sea World, we ended up buying 1 kid’s ticket for $35 for 2 days, they ran out at our first hotel, so that sucked, so we payed $55 for the rest of us for 2 days, still not a bad deal. Right now they have a deal adults pay kid’s price & you get 1 day for free. The crowds were not bad at all (not like Disneyland) & the temperature was nice. The first show we went to was Sea Lions Live, what a cute show!

The show used music from alot of TV Shows, it was funny!

Than we went to the Shark encounter, my son was soooo excited, he was sooo excited, he has been talking about it for a while, it was pretty cool especially when you went underground & got to walk thru a tunnel with the water above you & great white shark’s swimming over you.

The next show was The Shamu Show Believe, you need to get there about 30-45 mins before the show, there is a line up to get in, the kid’s wanted to sit in the soak zone, thankfully it was warm out & the sun was beating on our back’s because we got SOAKED!!! We brought a change of clothes for the kid’s thankfully.

We didn’t get that many pics of Shamu yet because we sat in the soak zone & I didn’t want to have my camera out because I didn’t know when we would be getting wet, it turns out that I could have had it out most of the time but, we will be going back Wednesday to watch the night show called Shamu Rocks & we will NOT be sitting in the soak zone.

Shamu Believe was an amazing show, it was beautiful, to tell you the truth I was even tearing up! Than later I found out that my hubby was too, I said oh, so it wasn’t just me & he said nope! There is a story to the show & just the interaction between human & whale was just unbelievable so that’s why we will definately be going back on Wednesday.

I do have a pic of what the stage looks like though:

My daughter & son with the biggest Shamu ever!

My son with a whale tale necklace, he said he “had” to have it so that he can be a trainer someday, you need to see the show to understand the whale tale necklace! He is pretty smitten with Shamu now.

Than we went & visited the sea lions where you can feed them but, me personally I wasn’t about to pay $6 for 1 fish to feed 1 sea lion & with 2 kid’s I’d have to buy 2, crazy! It was crazy though, they would come right up to the glass & “stand” up so that they could be fed.

The last show we saw for the day was Dolphin Discovery, again we were in the splash zone but, we were in row 9 or something so thankfully we didn’t get wet but, I was scared, the first 6 rows got SOAKED! by the time we realized how wet you could get it was too late to move.

Another spectacular show, my daughter really, really wanted to see this show & of course I love dolphins too, it was well worth the wait.

Dolphin & trainer before the show…warming up!

Dolphin Discovery lighthouse.

We spent 7 hours at Sea World today! I was beat. After the shows the kid’s spent some time in a giant play area, some crazy, mad obstacle & went on a couple of rides. It wasn’t just about the shows we saw today we saw some exhibits also like the Clydesdale horses.

After Sea World we checked into our 2nd hotel for the rest of our time in San Diego, the Comfort Inn & Suites Hotel Circle / Sea World, we got a kid’s suite again this time with a full kitchen so it will be good to be able to cook up some meals, there are 2 BBQ’s on site that we can use too. They also have a big continental breakfast included in our room rate which is great but, I never understand why the room never looks like the room I see in the pics on the internet! & why the carpet / floor is never clean (yuck), if you go bare foot your feet are always black…gagging!

The room again is nothing spectacular, the kid’s have bunk beds & we have a Queen size bed, we haven’t slept in a Queen size bed in a while so it was a little cramped!!! Our room is definately smaller than I thought it would be.

After we checked in the kid’s went swimming very quickly since it was dark & cooler out & than we grabbed a bite to eat came back to the room & crashed.

We started the morning out by going back to Target to really take a “closer” look. We bought some clothes for the kid’s including some adorable t-shirts by Paul Frank, such a cute clothing line.

Than we went to this cheapo store, can’t remember the name…Big something to look for beach toys, no such luck & nothing exciting there than the exciting store we went to was a scrapbook store called Scrapbook Your Life! the owner was very friendly & helpful, great scrapbook store with some great stuff, very big & she was very helpful telling us where what to visit in San Diego. She was also telling me that there have been about 36 scrapbooking stores in Southern California that have closed down, that sucks!

After shopping it was off to the beaches, we went to Cabrillo National Monument in Point Loma to look at tide pools, there wasn’t alot of them, we were hoping the kid’s could see some starfish but, nothing. Cabrillo National Monument is pretty amazing though, it’s gorgeous there.

Very cool tide pool.

Than it was off to Mission Beach, the kid’s wanted so badly to go swimming, play in the sand & collect some shells. It took us a while to find parking, some of these more “popular” beaches are just jammed pack, Mission Beach kind of reminds me a bit of Venice Beach with all the stores & vendors along the boardwalk. It was fun, I love to people watch!

For dinner we went to Phil’s BBQ which is right across from our hotel, last night we were heading off to a late dinner & we saw the line up at Phil’s BBQ, it was insane, I have never, ever seen anything like it, well today I found out it’s really good, so we got there around 4PM so we could beat the line up, well we still had to wait in line for about 25 minutes, so you line up, than you get inside the restaurant & place your order than you try to find a seat & than you have a beeper for when your food is ready, I’m not a fan of ribs but, my hubby is so he had ribs & I had chicken, my hubby said the ribs were really good, the kid’s said the sauce was spicey for them which I do agree with, we ordered way to much food, we could have shared 2 meals but, we have leftovers for tomorrow so that’s OK. I just couldn’t believe how busy this restaurant is & it’s all day & night.

This is the sign outside at the end of the building, we were waiting just past this sign.

The menu.

My daughter eating ribs, she barely made a dent in her meal.

My son eating a giant onion ring!

Well it’s an early night to bed tonight. We are off to another hotel tomorrow & to Sea World!