My good friend, Laura, came for some quality girl time before the arrival of Samwise (or Frodo or Gandalf or Bilbo depending on the day) – as our little one is often referred to.  We spent Thursday to Saturday shopping, scrapping, and enjoying lots of tasty treats.

We explored parts of my neighborhood with our morning walks.  This is one of the coolest looking trees in the neighborhood.

Thursday, November 11, 2010 : While Jim sat at home to grade papers, Laura and I …

shopped for holiday stamps at the Paper Garden,

devoured these sweet potato fries at The Counter in Roseville,

and spent hours perusing the aisles and aisles of paper and embellishments at Green Tangerines.

When we arrived home, we found Jim at the stove cooking dinner …

and we joined him for flank steak and salad.  Yum.

In the evening, Laura showed me how to make this …

Laura learned how to make the book from an online class with Amy Tangerine.  To assemble this wonderful little journal, we pulled out the sewing machine, gathered a bunch of scraps, trimmed them down to size, layered the pages and stitched the pages down the middle with a heavy duty sewing needle.  I love the end result and can totally see myself taking this with me on my travels to use as a travel journal.  Thanks, Laura!

Friday, November 12, 2010 : While my Jim and the rest of my friends were busy at work, Laura and I …

drove to Berkeley to shop at Scrapbook Territory.  Laura found what she came for — the entire collection of mists.  She was in mist heaven.  We also picked up the rest of our supplies for Ali’s December Daily project.

strolled along Fourth Street in Berkeley and found ourselves at Spencer’s Fish Grotto where I had this delicious seafood stew.

tried on silly hats at the Berkeley Hat Company.  ( I have my eyes on the Grover and Oscar hats.)

admired the hat collection at the Berkeley Hat Company.

In

the evening, we started our December Daily project.

Saturday, November 13, 2010 : On World Card Making Day, my friend Julie was out running 22 miles to prepare for a marathon in three weeks and Jim was at home watching 4400.  Laura and I …

worked on our December Daily Project through breakfast,

took a card making class at Green Tangerines,

finished a mini-book,

trimmed the transparencies and made tags for our December Daily book,

cooked dinner (spring rolls with lots of veggies),

and baked oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.

In the evening, Laura finished her December Daily book while I made some progress on mine.

I’ll post pages of Laura’s book in a separate post.

Sunday, November 14, 2010 :

Thanks so much for visiting, Laura!  Thank you for your creative ideas, energy and inspiration.  I appreciate you being here as you have helped me get out of my creative rut!  I so wish you were closer — these creative adventures are more fun with a friend who appreciates the art!