The Life of Mrs. Miles

VALENTINE TAG SET

(bonus ring created by Miles)

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Well I'm feeling VERY loved today! Where can I even begin? Well, course the FIRSTEST big news is my BIG Valentines Surprise for my sweetie. I can finally reveal all! I have been dying to share with you... now I can!

I LOVE HIM!

All in all I am just tickled with how this year's surprise turned out. It took 30 sheets of paper to print out and I know thats a ton of ink, but worth every single penny of it! I am providing the link of the program as my handy tip today so you will be able to do this for someone special too!

Last year I used a different method and I was happy with the results – but thats because I did not know this program existed! Last year's was a bit on the pixelated side – sort of composed of dots, like a comic, really – but the link for this new program arrived in my email inbox just a day ago and I decided to give it a try.

The CARD itself, I created as a 12 x 12 inch layout so I can keep it for the future... I took and resized it as an 8 x 8 x 150 dpi jpg before uploading to the poster site and it took only a MINUTE for my resulting file to be ready for me as a PDF file!! I simply had to download it and print... simple as that!

AWAITING MILES RETURN FROM THE GYM!

I use a cardstock white paper – standard 8.5 x 11 inch size, which I pick up inexpensively at Walmart. When I print I've learned to do a test page first (when I choose print, I ask it to print page 1 of 1) to make sure its what I want. Then, I also make a list of the pages on a separate piece of paper and I then print every page separately in the manner that I did the test page. This does take a lot more time ... but there is an advantage to this... If you tell the computer to print the entire lot and something messes up on say page 15 of 30 then you have to deal with that... also, by doing it one page at a time I am not worried if I get interrupted by... the phone, door, life.... I don't have to be chained to the printer. I also use the time in between to tick off the pages on my pencilled list – and mark on the back of each printed page (with pencil) the page number for easy assembly later – in case they get mixed up!

EVEN THE DRIVEWAY GETS DECORATED WITH CANDY HEARTS

So.. if you decide to do this fun fun thing for someone later on, you can benefit from a few things I've learned:

Forget trying to stick your poster to a metal garage door on a frigid day – until the sun comes up and dries it off!

Buy an inexpensive painting drop sheet so that you can cover your poster if its a rainy day and you want to hang it outside!

About the layout itself – I created the trophy element and I used the newspaper clipping generator on line to produce the newspaper article. If you don't know where that website is located you can simply type the words newspaper clipping generator into the little search box located on the top left of my blog – voila – blogger will take you to the entry where I featured that link as a handy hint!

So what other Valentines Day plans do we have? Unfortunately Miles works from 9 this morning until 8 tonight, so though we will have a romantic lunch, the evening is out. I did make him a special breakfast this morning of low-fat whole wheat raspberry pancakes with diet cool whip on top. I attempted to make the pancakes in heart shapes, but they kinda swell when you cook them and by the time they finished their puffing they resembled wonky circular shapes... oh well!!! This while parades of school kids and people wandered by ogling the BIG valentine outside our window! :) I have begged Miles NOT to even try to do something for me today as its soooo busy for him... instead he reluctantly agreed to take me out on Friday - when we can have a whole day to ourselves!

If this were not exciting enough - while listening to the Christian Radio Station (KMBI - link to the left) I caught a contest happening out of the corner of my ear and while flipping pancakes I managed to call in and win a CD! The station was featuring an article about singer Michael O'Brien who has just released a ROMANTIC cd and we were asked to call in and tell what plans we had for V-tines day! I was the first caller. You GOTTA go hear this talented singer. This is what he says about his album:

Mother’s Day 2004—and I heard those words that had so often inspired trepidation—“Heidi, I can’t wait to play a new song I wrote for you!” My stomach began to churn. Michael had just returned from a road trip, and I was looking forward to the day. What if I hate it? I thought. Michael will be hurt. I’ll feel guilty and our family time will be ruined with weirdness. I just don’t need this kind of pressure! Sensing my hesitancy, Michael said with an air of complete confidence, “Trust me. You are going to love it…I know you!” I sat down unconvinced as he grabbed his guitar and giggled like a kid on Christmas morning.

You can visit his website HERE

LILY'S LITTLE VALENTINE

created by KRISTIN CB - link to left

Kristin included a sucker with each Valentine to Lily's schoolmates!

Valentines Mini Kit by Dani Mogsted FREE!

OK - and if this is not already ENOUGH good stuff for my Valentines day.... I have been recieveing loving comments in in my inbox all morning long - THANK YOU SO MUCH from whoever is responsible at LETS SCRAP for promoting my blog at your forum. I just became aware of this and I am so touched and flattered. I can't thank you enough!! I am coming to check out your site in detail when things die down around my household!

With this... I must go and prepare for my LUV - for our lunchtime date. I wish you all a Blessed Valentines Day. For those of you who may be alone, or suffering or not able to enjoy this day - I've said a prayer for God to fill that spot in your heart today.

BARB'S HANDY TIP #201

Make Your Own Poster

This link will help you create Giant Greetings, just like the one I made. Its easy as 1,2.3.

BLOCK POSTERS