My mother in law, or “Gigi,” recently ordered four 16×24 canvases for herself after seeing the ones I have hanging in my living room (you remember those, right?).  Well, her canvases arrived this weekend and she had originally planned on hanging them in her bedroom.  My father in law, though, changed his mind and said they were too beautiful to hide away in their room.  They needed to be out in the living room for everyone to see instead.  He was right.  They look just awesome on her walls!  Nice choices Gigi!  And thanks for another great set of canvases Pixel2Canvas team!  These are the 16×24 canvases on a 3/4 inch stretcher frame – they come ready to hang!  Easy peezey lemon squeezy!

Yes, family & friends, it was only a matter of time before a Settlers blog post appeared.  In case you don’t know about Settlers of Catan, it’s a German board game that my family is obsessed about – or, that I am obsessed about winning.  Personally I think it’s like a cross between Monopoly & Risk.  Currently I am on a 3-month losing streak.  And, people, we don’t just play once in a while – we play at least once a week, sometimes more, and even more than one game in a sitting.  I am the official Settlers loser in my family, and I make sure to let them all know about it.  I stink!  I just don’t know why (they could all probably tell you), but I can’t seem to win.  Oh well, such is life.  And it’s just a game, right?

Today after Bert & Laura brought Emma back after her sleepover, we all had lunch at our house & played two games of Settlers.  Congratulations to Mom (Bonnie) & Bert on winning.  (You won’t be invited back, since you didn’t let me win).

In the photo above I’m the blue pieces.  As you can see at this point things didn’t look too terrible for me until Mom came full force with a massive road, cutting the entire land of Catan in half!  And Bert with his stinkin’ castles!  OMG!  How’s a person supposed to win with this kind of competition?  I even have Settlers of Catan on my iPhone so I can practice against highly-skilled computers but I just can’t seem to bring the winning into real life.  I’ll be sure to let you know when my streak ends.

Oh, and if you want to play with us, come on over.  We’re usually up for playing any day of the week, even into the wee hours of the night.  Sroka’s are always up for some competition!

Photos I’ve been looking at:  Melissa C.  She’s a person I randomly found though…you guessed it….Facebook!  I think I saw her comment on another 365 blog & clicked through to her blog & saw her photo of a crossword puzzle.  Immediately I thought of my dear grandmother who loves crosswords.  Melissa gave me such an encouraging comment the other day when I felt like giving up on this 365 thing.  Thanks for the push forward Melissa & I love looking at your work.  Keep it up!

*oh, and we’re such Settlers nerds that we bought Kids of Catan for our children.  Yup, we took it that far.

So when I married my wonderful husband Josh, I had didn’t realize I was marrying into such a creative, talented family.  It’s a lot of competition, I must say!  My husband, Josh, is really skilled at all things Mac, programming, and the techincal side of music.  His dad is a great CPA, and his mom, Bonnie, has been creating and crafting ever since I’ve known her.  Recently, (in the last 7 years) she has made quite a following for herself on eBay selling all kinds of things.  She started painting sweet, shabby chic flowers on vintage and antique items, and has recently moved on to creating Shrink Plastic & resin earrings.  Occasionally, when I have time, she asks me to snap some photos of her stuff.  I usually try to do this during my littlest girl’s nap time because my girls just go “ga-ga” over “Gigi’s” jewelry.  So, in the interest of trying to blog more faithfully, and sharing my life with you all, I had to share with you some super cute stuff that my mother in law is making these days.  Here are some items from her shop, Fun Jewelry: