Crazy Life at The Warner's

I have been scrapbooking some things with Stacy's kits. She has become a designer and I think her kits are awesome. Here are some of the layouts I did with them. I have a link to her store check it out.

The other day in my searching for digi scrapping materials I found this saying: "God made us cousins because he know our moms couldn't handle us as siblings." I instantly thought of Brayden and Eric. Those two crack me up. I am glad that they are such good friends. So I decided I needed to make a page with those two and I had Chelsea take pictures over at Grandma's. Here is what I came up with.

Here is the cute pic Janae took of Austin. He looks so much like his dad.

Here is the great photo Janae took of Brayden. He always has a smile on his face. He cheers me up when I am having a bad day.

It always amazes me that I have a child that is already 16. I love that he is such a great kid and so handsome. He asked a girl to Homecoming even though it's not his first date it was fun to watch him figure out how to ask her to go and then get his answer. It has been a fun week with him.

What do you do when you go out of town and you have a SIL who takes awesome pictures? Scrapbook it of course!!!!
Janae also did a photo shoot with our family a couple of weeks ago and here are the pictures she took of Chelsea.
Thanks Janae for the great pictures. I am going to work on the boys in the next few days. Stacy would be telling me right now to finish my Australia book. I will, I will. :)

I decided that I am never going to be a very good scrapbooker like my sisters, but that all changed at girls weekend. We went to Pebbles and I found the perfect solution for me. You take a 12x12 album and instead of designing 12x12 pages you make a title page and a journal page and put all of that with your pictures into 4x6 sleeves. I think I can totally handle that. So far I hadn't done a thing with it because I think it still seemed like too much work. Good thing I have Stacy around to inspire me to digiscrap. I am downloading my title and journal pages that I have created so far from our trip. It probably won't make much sense, but when the album is put together it will be awesome. I am loving digiscrap!!!!

Here's another one. This is great fun.

I am so excited that I could figure this out. I'm sure glad I could ask Stacy a few questions, however. This was super fun. I think I might be able to scrapbook like this. I just got out the computer, turned it on and then when I was finished turned it back off. I should be able to take the computer with me to soccer games. Tell me what you think.

So now that I have been home for a week and I feel like I am back to normal I have had some time to think about the things I really loved about Australia. Here are a few of them: hanging out with Mark, hanging out with Kev, Stacy, Madi, Cooper and Rylee, Stacy's cooking, walking on the beach looking for seashells, listening to the Kookaburras sing, trying new things and the beautiful flowers and birds.
I loved spending time with Mark and doing things that I don't normally do. Mark is defiantly more adventurous than I am, but I decided while we were in Australia that I should just try things and see what could happen. I don't think I am completely over my fear of water, but I am not as afraid as I used to be. I don't like to fly because of the take-offs and landings, but even that didn't bother me this time around. I tried new foods like: fish and chips, a great Korean restaurant, sausage, meat pies, Ginger Beer, vegemite, hot chocolate and pizza. I know pizza is not new, but in Australia it has a different taste and I like it much better than our pizza around here.

Stacy is an awesome cook and has learned how to cook lots of different things from scratch. I don't mean buy a cake mix and add water, I mean flour, sugar, vanilla, etc. Dinner tonight is a recipe from Stacy, yummy chicken. I had a great time going to the shops and finding out the things you need aren't all under one roof like WalMart. I even took my "green bags" with me this week when I went shopping.
I actually miss the Kookaburras singing to us every morning. They are a beautiful bird and I fell in love with them. For the first week or so I could only hear them I had never seen one and finally in Stacy's backyard we found one. I tried while we were there to video them or at least the sound they make and every time I was ready with the video camera they stopped singing. They have lots of really colorful birds, but I don't know all the names of them. I guess I will have to look them up.
I loved looking for seashells and I brought four boxes of seashells home. I found some glass containers at Target the other day and put all my shells in them. I love the beach and the water is so warm. I think I could have gone to the beach every day. It is very relaxing to watch the water come onto the shore. I have always loved the feel of sand between my toes.
We did lots of touristy things and those were all lots of fun too, but I think I will remember Australia for these reasons.

He finished his project in Nov of 2008. He choose to have a Cold Winter Drive and take the collected items to the local shelter. We decided that not only should the scouts help, but our family should take the opportunity to help too. It was a great experience and we still talk about it and how grateful we should be for the things that we have.

He is almost ready to pin the mom and dad pins on us. That was so cool. I know how hard he has worked since he was 11. The funny thing is that they only reason he worked on his eagle was to drive a car. I did ask him today if he thought it was worth it to become an Eagle Scout and he told me it is. I am proud of Avery and how hard he has worked on becoming an eagle.
Avery had a mentor pin for somebody who he felt had helped him throughout his life. It could have been a scout leader, church leader, friend or family member. He chose his Grandma Cooper. I think that she was a little bit surprised by this, but what a great moment for a grandma to know how much she has helped her grandkids.
Avery is a great kid and we are proud of him and all of the things that he works so hard to accomplish.

The next Eagle Scout in our family is well on his way too. Austin received his Star at the Court of Honor. Keep up the great work Austin.

During the 2nd week of our trip we spent the week walking all around Sydney and taking in the sites. We went to the Blue Mountains with Kevin, Stacy and Rylee. It was a great time. I tried to walk down the stairs to the sister rock, but I only made it half way down before I started panicking. The huge drop-off of course had nothing to do with it. Sometimes it's not fun to be scared of heights.

The Three Sisters

Still smiling.

Start of the panic.

The weather was beautiful and the sky had a blue haze to it. The heat of the day heats of the Gum Trees and puts eucalyptus oils in the air and makes the blue haze on the mountains. Some of the people in Stacy's ward asked if we were going to the Blue Mountains and I laughed to myself when I saw them because they are so small compared to the mountains around here. It was more fun to go there because of all the cute little towns and shops on the way there.

The Chocolate Store. Awesome hot chocolate.

Poor Mark.
The next day we went to the Taronga Zoo. We took the train into the city and then caught a ferry across Circular Quay to the zoo entrance. You take a sky ride all the way to the top and then work your way back down to the bottom. We saw a lot of really pretty birds, koalas, kangaroos, otters and all kinds of other animals. We were a little disappointed because we never saw the platypus.

Next on the list of things to see while in Australia was the beach and seashell hunting. I brought home 4 boxes of seashells. Stacy didn't think I could get them into the country, but they didn't even ask about them on our customs papers. So we headed off to Avalon Beach hunting for shells.


The next day we were waiting for the arrival of the next visitors at Stacy's house, Brandon, Julie and Claire. Madi and Cooper were so excited because they didn't have to go to school. After Brandon and Julie got a little settled we headed out for our next adventure to Darling Harbour. We went to Paddy's Market, Maritime Museum and the Aquarium.

Maritime Museum

I'm really glad I don't have to live on a submarine. I would get so claustrophobic.

Aquarium. It was soooo cool. They had walkways surrounded by the water and the fish, sharks, sting rays and turtles just swam around you.

The last day of our vacation we went to the Koala Park. It is close to Kevin and Stacy's and they had never been there before. I think it was one of the most fun places we went. It's among the top three anyway.




I love koalas and they are so soft. It was awesome to be that close to them.

We fed the Kangaroos. That was really fun.

Then we went to a Korean place for dinner. It was called Ben's .... I can't remember the rest, maybe Stacy can help me out.

The food was delicious and I loved the atmosphere. We cooked our own food at the table and I tried lots of new things.

No, I didn't try the octopus like Mark did, I am not that adventurous.
After dinner we headed off the the Sydney Temple to do a session.

What a great way to end our vacation serving in the House of the Lord.

Some of the things that I love about Sydney are the beautiful flowers, the colorful birds, the kookaburras and the cockatoos singing to us every morning, all the green space they preserve and spending time with family.

A beautiful kookaburra.