Week 2 I Heart Faces

This weeks photo challenge is "Best Face Photo"
I can't tell you how hard it was to choose a photo for this one! I had so many to choose from and I had so many I love. I picked this photo because of the sweetness and pureness in his face. Thomas was about 3 months old in this photo and I think it has to be in the top 3 of my favorites. Even if this photo doesn't win it is a winner in my eyes. My baby will be 5 this March and this picture seems like it was taken yesterday. Time goes by way to fast and you need to enjoy every minute you have with them while they are small.

Take a look at all the entries in this weeks photo contest on the I Heart Faces Blog! This is a fun and awesome week to stop by.

Sweet Dreams Week

This is my entry for the I Heart Faces Photo Challenge called Sweet Dreams.
This is Emily at the end of the yr preschool picnic on the beach. The older kids were playing so nicely together and having fun on the beach, poor Emi couldn't keep up and just ended up falling asleep in the swing.
Too Cute!!



This picture below is just a shot a little further away so you can see her hanging there and she kept moving her head trying to get a more comfy spot.

I Heat Faces Photo Challenge Week 21

I know most of you have seen this darling face already but I have decided to enter Reese's wonderful smile into a photo challenge. If you haven't seen the I Heart Faces blog then you really need to stop by and take a look. Every week they have new challenges going on and I love looking at all the entries. So now I am taking the next step and entering!

If you missed the shirt that Reese won for the best smile and to learn a little more about him you can go here to read more on this wonderful part of our family.

I Finally Won Something!

Well, not really me. This cutie face won "The Cutest Pet Contest" on a great blog called Furrytwang! He won his own T Shirt. We picked out the one that says Spoiled Rotten. Which he is of coarse! They also have a website with some great southern based T shirts. Stop by if you have a chance, it is a really cute site with many different types of shirts and sayings. You can also follow Furrytwang on Twitter. Thank you Jodi for the great prize and a picture of Reese in his shirt will be on the way when his shirt gets here!

This is Reese. He is a 10 yrs old Border Collie/Dalmatian mix who acts like he is about 2. We picked him up at the local pound when he was about 1. He was jumping so high in the pen and was a crazy man but there was good reason for it. He was so full of love but no one wanted to love him. He was found wondering the street and brought to the pound when he was a few months old. He was then adopted 2 times and brought back to the pound both times. He was taken in the 1st time and returned after a week because he was to hyper and the second time he was returned for the same reason but after about 3 weeks. Yes, he was hyper!! Jumping all over, running like a mad man but I think if I was locked up for that long I would have been doing the same.

While at the pound I took him out to the pen to see what he was like. He was a doll. You could see in his face that all he wanted was to be loved and to love you. He was jumping all over me and was trying to lick me to death. You really need to watch that tongue...it always wants to lick! There was no way I could walk away without him! He has turned out to be such a great dog! He was and is trained very easily and quickly. He is so smart (must be the Border Collie in him) I trained him to lay down near the table when we eat. He won't even lift his head until we are done. He will not lay under the table (I HATE that). He can sit, stay, roll over, paw, lay down, speak and best of all smile! Yes he really does smile. He lifts up his upper lip and shows his teeth but if you can see him do it his whole face gets into it just like when we do a real big smile. I am trying to get a picture of it but it happens so quick I can't get a good pic. Reese is also a great dog with kids. He doesn't care what is done to him. This dog has a heart of gold! I remember when Thomas was a few months old and he was lying on the floor and Reese can into the room and tried to step over Thomas. Well, at that moment Thomas decided he was going to roll and Reese caught Thomas's arm with his back foot. Thomas started crying and Reese took off and went and crouched by the door with his head down and wouldn't look at me. I saw the whole thing so I know he was being gentle and trying to step over Thomas, he never meant to hurt him. I felt so bad for Reese that I went over to him and spoke to him like he was human. I told him I know he was trying to be careful and that he didn't do anything wrong. He then gave me a kiss and was much better. Can you tell how much I love this dog?

He is the best dog you could ever ask for and there will never be a replacement for him.

The one flaw about Reese....NEVER let him off his run!!! We can't fence in our yard due to all the rock in our yard so we have him on a 100ft run. If he gets off his run....we get in the car to go fetch him. He is a white streak running down the road...LOL! I swear he has some greyhound in him. He is super fast. He hasn't calmed or slowed down at all since we got him. He still loves his long walks by the water, but hates to swim. We take him to my neighbors who has a large fenced in yard and he plays with their 2 black labs.

So to those families that let this love of a dog go....Eat your hearts out!! You missed out on the best dog you could have ever owned!

This is Reese playing with his grouchy sister, Sasha. As you can see she puts Reese in his place when needed and she will go after any dog that doesn't belong in our yard. Can we say Ornery. She is about 14 and we rescued her too. She was about to be put down when she was about 5 because her owner didn't want her anymore so we took her in. She is a typical female dog...no pun intended..LOL! She is an old girl set in her ways and has gotten bitchier the older she has gotten. We love her no less but she does need an attitude adjustment...LOL!!!

Reese with his Christmas bandanna on.

We love all our animals just the same and we couldn't ask for a happier household of 2 dogs and 3 cats, a bird, a 50 gallon fish tank and our chickens and of coarse my boys!

Artfire Easter Egg Hunt

Do you like Easter Egg Hunts? Do you like to win prizes?
On Wednesday April 1, Artfire will be holding a Easter Egg Hunt for all to join in on. I believe there are 50 studios involved in this hunt and you can play for 1 of 3 prizes. Prizes go to the highest score who will win a $50 gift voucher, 2nd highest gets a $20 gift voucher and 3rd highest gets a $10 gift voucher. The best part is, you get to use your gift voucher in ANY of the participating stores! Make sure as you are looking for eggs that that you check out everyones stores so when you win you will know what items you would like to purchase! You can get all the information on how to enter and what you need to do here on the Easter Egg Hunt Blog.
This is the first time I have been involved in something like this and I am very excited about it. Moonstone of Artfire has put this whole thing together and has spent A LOT of time on it. Please stop by and sign up!! Don't worry if you don't have a lot of time to do something like this, it is going on for 3 full weeks, so you have plenty of time!! If you have any questions on the process you can leave a message on the blog and Moonstone will get right back to you. You can also leave a message for me here and I will find out the answer for you.

Come by and join in the fun for some great prizes!!

Giveaway Winner

I would like to say thank you to all who entered! It was great fun to look at everyones stores. I would also like to thank Dawn at Lifesmomentscaptured for helping me with this giveaway. We enjoyed it and we hope you did too!

The lucky winner for the banner giveaway is....Lillies!

Thank you everyone and have a safe and fun St. Patricks Day!

Banner Giveaway!

Do you have a lame or ugly banner? Does your banner hurt peoples eyes? Maybe you are banner less or in some need of fine tuning.

Then let us help!

Baci's Creations, PaprikasPlace and Life's Moments Captured have teamed up to give one lucky shop a spring makeover! The winning shop will be able to pick any basic banner and avatar set of their choice from Life's Moments Captured Etsy or Artfire shop (excludes custom orders).

This was a fun contest that came about on the Artfire forums in which a shop named PicardCreative decided to do something nice for someone and offered to purchase a banner and avatar set for someone who had the "Fulgiest Banner". Baci's Creations was one of the winners in the first contest and wanted to extend the act of kindness to someone else in need and purchase a banner and avatar set for the winner here. Dawn at Life's Moments Captured is so sweet to offer her services once again! She has 2 amazing shops with many styles and colors to choose from. I know you will find something you will love in one of her stores!

Let the contest Begin!!

This is what you need to do:

1. Go to Dawns Etsy and or Artfire shops and pick the banner and avatar set that you would like to see in your shop.

2. Leave a link to your shop with your name and tell us why you deserve or need a new banner! Also make sure you leave the link to the banner and avatar that you want changed, this is what is going to be judged.

3. Tell us how you would give back to the Etsy and/or Artfire community if you had the chance (examples: give someone their first sale,offer a service, purchase a new banner ETC)

Please make sure you stop by Baci's Creations and PaprikasPlaces shops. Both shops are offering 10% discount on anything in either store for the length of this giveaway. Please include "lame banner" in note to seller during checkout.

If you have a problem leaving a comment please be sure to let us know or enter into the contest through Lifesmomentscaptured,Paprikasplace or Baciscreations, just leave us a message! :)

Contest will close at 6 pm EST Monday 3/16.

Winner will be picked by their families of the participating shops based on the lamest/ugliest banner.

Winner will be contacted on Tuesday 3/17.

Please be nice and have fun!

Kissing up will not get you further ahead but would be enjoyable and fun!

Please make sure you also stop by Picards shop and take a look :) Trust me you won't be disappointed!

1st Blog Giveaway!!!

I would like to announce that tomorrow 3/9 I will be launching my first giveaway!!!

I have teamed up with a wonderful women named Dawn (who I will introduce to you more tomorrow) who makes wonderful banners and avatars in both of her shops on Etsy and Artfire. I had a new banner and avatar made by her from a contest on the Artfire forums called the "Fugliest Banner Contest". I had so much fun in this contest that I have decided to do the same and purchase a banner set for someone else out there that has a banner that needs help.

I will fill in the full details tomorrow when the contest starts.

Please get the word out! If you know someone who has an ugly banner or even no banner at all, let them know about our contest!

See you tomorrow!

Fugliest Banner Contest

A few days ago, Picardcreative started a post in the Artfire forums that she was shopping on Artfire and decided she wanted to buy something for someone else. How cool is that!!!So she started "The Fugliest Banner Contest". Well, I had to join in. My banner was just nasty!! My brother, who is an IT major and works for Microsoft, made me a banner and it was just bright, ugly and pitiful (as you can see above). I thought he would do something nice for me, but I was just happy I had something up. Anyway, There was 2 of us who stood up and said we had ugly banners and 1 had none!! Well, the good news is, we all won. Picardcreative said she would purchase the 1st and 2nd place banners and SoyScentual said she would make the 3rd place banner for free!



So now that we won, we got to deal with this amazing woman, Dawn, at LifesMomentsCaptured. You can find her on Artfire and Etsy. Come to find out, Dawn, generously offered her services to us. Way too cool also!!! She is such a sweet and patient person. I told her a round about way I wanted the banner to look and she tried many times until I saw exactly what I wanted. She says I didn't drive her nuts but I drive myself nuts so I can only imagine what I did to her...LOL. It was such a wonderful experience working with her and getting to know her.
Here is the new banner and avatar that she made for my mother and I at our Artfire store! Aren't they wonderful. She hit the nail right on the head with these. We liked them so much that we are now purchasing business cards from Dawn!

For you those don't know about the name Baci's Creations. This is the name of my mothers store on Artfire and Baci means grandmother in Polish. My mother is a Baci of 3 grandsons and a beautiful granddaughter!!


You really need to check out all the great work in all of these wonderful and generous stores. Now I would like to come up with something to do that is as nice as Picardcreative did...I would like to spread the love too! I just need to come up with an idea...this could take a while. I would love some suggestions if anyone has some. Pass them along. I would love to hear them!!






I just want to say that my whole experience on Etsy, Artfire and with blogging have been wonderful. I have met some wonderful people and made some new amazing friends! If I never sell anything else on either site or write another post here, I will be grateful for the people I have met and can now call friends!
I also want to send a very special thank you out to everyone who took part in this. It is really nice to know that people are still nice out there in this strange world. Thank you to everyone!!!!