Big Crumbs...

Have you heard of it? It's a website called BigCrumbs.com. I heard about it from my sister in law, and I decided to give it a try.

Basically, I click on there before I shop online (including ebay!), and I make money back from my purchases. Believe me when I say I checked it out, and there is NO CATCH--you just have to remember to log into there BEFORE shopping.

The part I didn't trust, and had to look into some more, was the fact that I would earn money off of people that I referred there, too. Guess what? NO CATCH! So, skeptical ol' me decided to give it a try. I do ALOT (if not MOST) of my shopping online, so why not?

So, go check it out and see what you think--if you find a catch, PLEASE LET ME KNOW!! I just couldn't find one, no matter how hard I looked. If you think it's something you'd like to try, PLEASE use me as your referral.

MY USER NAME/CODE/REFERRAL PERSON THING IS: vintagepearl

If you just want to sign up based on my recommendation, you'll want to sign up as a CrumbEARNER (not CrumbSAVER), this way, you'll earn money off of people YOU refer.



A couple of other things you might want to know:

* They do NOT ask for any kind of financial information from you.
* You do need a PAYPAL account--this is how they pay you.
* They only ask for your e-mail address--and this address should be linked to your Paypal account.


Here's a quick link for you. I've put it on my side bar, too.

brothers...

Somehow I managed to talk my boys into taking some pics for me.

Okay okay, I bribed them. Whatever.

They are SOOOO much harder to take pics of than Tessa, they wiggle and giggle alot more...





I think this one is my favorite...



I think he's whispering something like "Our Mom is a picture taking nut"... whatever it was, Caleb quickly agreed...



Caleb kept on checking his watch. I asked, "Do you have a hot date that I don't know about?" to which he giggled and replied "noooo..."



This one is dark and I couldn't get any sort of color on his skin, but I think he looks so handsome...



Afterwards we went out front so they could shoot some baskets and I snuck in one more :)

Concentrating with the tongue out...



I'm praying that Photoshop is in my near future, my editing would be so much better! Don't ya'll agree? (Say yes! Say yes! Help me convince the hubbie that I NEED it!)

Oh, and for those of you wondering- we didn't make it to Dallas. Ryan had gotten tickets to the pro golf torney down there for him and the boys (Tessa and I were going to SHOP!), but since Tiger Woods was hurt and not going to be there, Ryan no longer wanted to go :P

who needs toys...

when you have blankets and chairs to make a tent...



I heard them playing "house" in there...



and they were calling each other "Ryan" and "Erin"...



I also heard some dog barking...?

Here's something new I made for a friend of mine that's adopting a sweet baby girl from China. The baby's name is Hope...



You can get one in my shop.

Tomorrow after Jonah's soccer game we're heading to Dallas for a little family getaway, hope you all have a fabulous weekend!!!

and the winner is...

LIZ!!! Who guessed "washing machine". Can't you see it? *snicker*

Email me Liz and let me know what you'd like from my shop :)

contest time... guess the pic!

I'm in the mood for a contest and thought this would be fun...

Tessa drew this picture for me yesterday and it's now front and center on my fridge:



In order to win, just tell me WHAT this is a picture of :) You can guess as many times as you would like!

The first one to guess WINS!!!

The prize- you pick whatever piece of jewelry you want from my shop!!!

So let the guessing begin... :)

the blame game...

Every once in awhile, Tessa waits too long to go potty and she pees in her pants a bit (she's 3). Why am I telling you this? Because she did it today.

And then she tried to tell me this:

"Mommy, Ricky peed in my pants. But he's very sorry and he won't do it again."

Um, yeah. Sure.


Cuz this is Ricky:



I'm wondering, did she really expect me to buy this?

Have I mentioned before how well she keeps me entertained?

Jonah ramblings...

Caleb was gone to school.

Caleb had just bought 2 new sets of Star Wars legos with his birthday money and left them on the dining room table (aka the "lego table").

Jonah had the new legos all to himself!

He gets to work. I thought it was taking him awhile but he was focused.

After awhile he calls me in to see what he'd made... (the tall guy):



So I ooh'd and aah'd over it.

And then I realized what took him so long... he had the instructions upside down the entire time...

for Mother's Day...

I LOVE getting gift certificates, it's a chance for me to shop for free!

Let ME take care of Mom's gift this year! She can get her own custom piece of jewelry, something she can pick out and cherish forever :)

Any amount is available, just email me if you need a different amount.

You can find them in my shop.

a great cause, please go bid...

CLICK HERE to find and support the auctions supporting this cause. There are LOTS of great items to choose from and more to come!

a not-so-typical saturday night...

We spent last night at the hospital with Caleb...



We had a busy day outside all afternoon with soccer games and then Ryan and Gpa D took the kids to the park and they hit golf balls and hit some balls at the batting cages. On the way home, around 5:30, Ryan noticed in the rear view mirror Caleb didn't look quite right.

Thinking he was just worn out and exhausted from a busy day and maybe dehydrated, Ryan laid him on our bed and tried to give Caleb water to which Caleb was totally unresponsive. We would try talking to Caleb but he just stared off into space. Ryan scooped him up and headed to an after hours clinic...



At the clinic, as Ryan was checking Caleb in, Caleb had a full blown seizure right there in Ryan's arms. The staff yelled to call 911 as Ryan held on tight. He put his finger in Caleb's mouth to keep his teeth safe and it last 5-6 minutes, although to Ryan it seemd like forever. After it was over the staff started getting ready to transport Caleb in an ambulance to the Emergency room and Ryan calls me, in tears, to tell me what happened.

I met them at the hospital along with my Dad and Ryan's parents, and by the time they arrived Caleb was pretty sedated to help keep him calm. It's hard seeing your child all wraped up in wires, nose oxygen, chest stickers... I can't even imagine having to see what all Ryan saw.

They did a Catscan, EKG and blood work all of which came back NORMAL, thank you LORD!



We got our own room at the Children's Hospital about 11pm, Caleb had fallen asleep around 9pm, slept through his transport to the room, and didn't wake up til 3:30 am. I slept with him in his bed and when he woke up he asked us "why am I here?" He doesn't remember anything after the car ride home after the park.

He seems totally back to normal now and all of the doctors are positive he's going to be just fine. They have no idea WHY he had the seizures, and say he may or may not have another one. Some kids just have occasional seizures with unknown causes. We will be seeing a pediatric neurologist to discuss everything and we've been given medicine to give to him during a seizure if it happens again that will calm him down, but we're believeing this was his LAST ONE!!!

All of Caleb's memories are positive ones which I'm thankful for! He loves the "cast" they gave him that was to protect his iv. He loved that he could eat whatver he wanted and the first thing he ordered at 4 am was ice cream and milk. Caleb thought the hospital bed was lots of fun (lots of buttons) and made it go up and down as he pleased, plus they had an X-Box for him to play...





He was given a bear by one of his nurses, unfortunately Ryan is a Nebraska Cornhusker fan! Caleb has named him "Bo" after his ER doctor...



Ryan ran home in the morning to take a shower, grab some clean clothes for Caleb and bring breakfast (and COFFEE!), so I had him grab my camera so Caleb would have memories of his hospital trip...



You can see form the pics he's feeling ALL BETTER!

LOTS of THANKS to all of our friends and family that watched the little ones, called, stopped by, brought us food and prayed, we told Caleb about each one of you and he just grinned :)

flowers are swell...

I collaborated with Sheila of Fiddlestix*studio using some of the beautiful Swell fabrics from Moda, I really love this line...


find the jewels here...



and the adorable apron outfit here...



Tessa loved wearing these pants, she thought they were so fun!



Thanks Sheila, we had fun working with you!

a random conversation with Tessa...

This took place while waiting for my doctor's appointment today...

Tessa (she's 3): You know, you don't look like my Mommy today.

Me: I don't?

Tessa: Nope.

Me: Then what do I look like?

Tessa: You look like a ROCK STAR.


It's amazing what a little makeup, fixed hair and normal clothes will do for ya... :)

practicing...

I was practicing taking some moving pics on Tessa today... I can't decide if I like them better in color...



or black and white...



which do you prefer?



I love feet pictures...











We spent the morning outside since the weather was beautiful, and then after Jonah came home we ran over to one of my girlfriend's house to take their family dinner. They just had a beautiful baby girl a little over a week ago.

For some reason (this is totally not like me) I decided to leave the kids in the car while I ran in real quick to drop off the dinner... we started to chat and one of their son's accidently let their dog in and the next thing I know he has attatched his teeth to my leg! (I am soooooo thankful I left the kids in the car and he wasn't attatched to one of their legs!) I'm also thankful they have a pretty small dog!

So now I'm left with this on the back of my leg...



and this on the front...



They feel just awful, and I feel so bad that they feel so bad! They cleaned it up a bit and I left. I called Ryan (who is, once again, out of town!) and I started to cry, mostly from being shook up because the pain was down to a dull throbbing.

When we got home the kids saw it (and the blood dripping down my leg) and they didn't know what to think. They were speechless (for once!) They stood in total silence as they watched me put medicine on it and clean it up and everything, and then when I was done they both just gave me a big hug. Tessa has continued to give me random hugs, telling me she's gonna make it all better!

It's already feeling better but I'm still kinda shocked...!!!

it's a surprise...

"For me? I love surprises!"

My design group, the Not so Plain Jaynes, is turning 4! To celebrate we're all auctioning off SURPRISE SETS! How fun is that?

To see mine (and win some SURPRISE CUSTOM jewels), click HERE!

I started them at .99!!!!!!!!!!

where'd I go...?

Thanks to those of you who have emailed to check up on me... you're right, it's rare for me to be quiet for so long...!

So where'd I go? We had to have our septic system replaced last week (let's all say it together- EEEWWWWWWWW!) Because it had rained so much last week the ground was really soft and the tractor that was tearing up our backyard (Ryan is soooo happy about that) sunk into our cable wires and disconnected them--- leaving us without cable or internet for the entire weekend, ACK!

The cable guys tried coming out on Saturday to fix the wires while we were at soccer games, but our mean and viscious dog scared them away *snicker*- he's more apt to lick you to death than anything.

The irony? There have been MANY times that I have just randomly looked in the backyard and have seen one or more cable guys back there working- we have a main box by our back fence that runs several houses (maybe the whole neighborhood as much as they're back there!) I have been so mad with them before for not letting me know they would be back there. I'm thinking it's our yard, they should have to let us know, right? Once my kids came in and said there was a man in the backyard, he just climbed in from over the fence in the back (he didn't even use the gate). Another time we came home and my kids ran outside to play to find about 6 workers digging up our yard along the back fence- yet no one had let us know ahead of time they'd be back there and our "viscious" dog just kept dropping his chewed up soccer ball at their feet in hopes they would kick it for him. They were digging huge holes and they weren't getting into trouble, they were his heroes...

I've called to complain and asked to make a note to call ahead or come to the door and let us know if they need to be in our backyard, but they still don't.

Wouldn't you be mad????

So probably a dozen times or so, when we didn't want the cable guys in our yard, they were back there with the dog tagging along just fine but without permission. The one time we want them back there so they can fix something for us, they get scared of the dog and leave. *sigh*

Hopefully it gets fixed today so I don't have to keep coming to this coffee shop with my laptop... and eating a muffin... and maybe some carrot cake... and of course the peppermint hot chocolate... my doctor will not be happy with me at weigh in this week!

If you've emailed me and I haven't replied, I'm so sorry! You may want to try to email me again as it may have gotten lost in the email build-up over the last few days.


I have some upcoming collaborations and new jewels to show, so stay tuned and I'll be back to my regularly scheduled blogging...

you might be a redneck...

This evening I was listening to my kids play with legos while folding laundry and waiting for Daddy to get home. The boys were making army guys, Tessa was building a house and I'm daydreaming about jewelry (and a maid).


Then Caleb says something in his army-guy-talking-voice that captures my attention and I snap back to reality: "Hey there, I'm a redneck."


"What did you say?" I ask immediately. This isn't normal vocabulary in our house and I begin wondering who he heard it from.


"My army guy," Caleb replies. "He's a redneck."


Then he shows me this:



Ahhh, I see. So he is a redneck.

halo-hattie is listed...

The gorgeous outfit that I collaborated with Kymberle of Halo-Hattie on is now listed HERE!



It has AMAZING smocking details...



It will be remade custom sized for a lucky little girl! Don't miss it!

thank you Unpink ladies!!!!

So I get a package in the mail today and I just couldn't figure out what it was. I didn't remember ordering anything. So I unwrap it and I find this:



And now I'm thinking I REALLY don't remember ordering this, but it's super cute and glad I did! Then I read the card on the top that reads

"to baby girl E. with love, from Gina and the Unpink ladies".



How incredibly sweet are they?!!! Gina has been one of my biggest supporters since she found me and has been so encouraging to me. When I found out I was pregnant she mailed me this.

I love the Amy Butler fabric used in this taggie blanket from belle etoile designs on Etsy, and the back has super soft minky fabric.



Thank you so much Gina, I truly appreciate you!

my talented Tessa...

Having 2 older brothers, Tessa has learned how to do a few things that maybe some other 3 year old girls may not do... like cruise around on a 2 wheeled razor scooter...



She whips around on it pretty fast, wearing a dress of course...



She pretty much thinks she can do whatever the boys can do...



But give her a baby sized tractor like this one...



...and she falls right over...



She's always good at making us laugh :)