A few projects

I have a few more projects to share with you.  The first is a layout of our trip to Shakespeare's Globe Theatre to watch Taming of the Screw and Jesse's birthday dinner afterwards.  I used Paper Secrets' June 15th sketch for this layout.

I also made this card from My Mind's Eye's Lost & Found Portobello Road collection, and based it off their June sketch.

Bocks in New Mexico

My mom and Jeff came out to visit us for a long weekend.  First stop?  Alcohol.  We did some wine tasting at Gruet winery (a much better than expected experience).

Jesse grilled some tasty salmon and we busted out the good china, crystal, and silver.  And bubbly, of course.

The next morning we took a tram ride and took pictures of the gorgeous view.

After spending a few hours at the National Museum of Nuclear Science & History, we all went to Los Poblanos Historic Inn and Organic Farm for dinner.  It was a little over the top ($12 drizzle of aged balsamic vinegar anyone?) but the grounds were lovely and the food was incredibly good.

We spent Sunday at church and then on the couch for two World Cup games straight.  After that experience, we needed retail therapy so we headed out to Santa Fe on Monday.  We took the "turquoise trail" to Santa Fe and stopped in Madrid, where we saw some pretty and fun art pieces.  When in Santa Fe, we perused jewelry shops, hat shops, galleries, and had dinner at the Shed.

They leave bright and early (waaaay too early) tomorrow!

Single Pages

Instead of doing my typical two-page layouts, I have been creating coordinating single layouts on some of my pages from our Europe trip because it just seemed to work better that way given the pictures I had.  This first page is of my work trip to Guernsey when I got to walk down to the water and see the castle.  I based my layout on Blue Fern Studios' June sketch and used one of their beautiful medallions.  

This second page is of the Premier League match between Arsenal and West Ham.  I used Paper Secrets' June sketch challenge, and included Doodling (faux stitching), an Arrow, Numbers, Chipboard, and the theme of the page is Europe.

Porcelain Pages

I created more layouts of our trip to England using Basic Grey's Porcelain collection.  This first layout of our day trip to Bath is based on My Creative Sketches' May sketch.

Yes, I created a whole page about Harrods.  Jesse went once, I went twice, and Nelson went three times during the few days we were in London!  I was inspired by Scrapbook Expressions' June sketch when putting this layout together.

Anniversary in San Francisco

Last weekend we celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary with a trip to San Francisco (yes, right after Rachel moved from San Francisco, I know!)  The first night we were there, we splurged on dinner at Farallon (I think this was our most expensive dinner to date!).  We enjoyed good wine recommended by their sommelier and excellent fish and scallops.  It was certainly a treat!

On Saturday, we took a tour to Muir Woods and wine country led by our hilarious German tour guide.  We started the day at Muir Woods where we were able to hug beautiful redwood trees!  It was a lovely and peaceful experience.

After our tree hugging, we moved on to the wine.  We tasted wine at two Sonoma wineries and one Napa winery, and picked up a couple bottles to bring home.  We also had a lovely lunch in Sonoma as well.

At the end of our tour, the guide made a couple stops to give us picture-perfect (and windy!) views of the Golden Gate Bridge.

The next day, we walked around the embarcadero, enjoying excellent coffee, beautiful bay views, and weather.

And sea lions!  They were a riot!

(Notice the sea lions fighting in the back -- an alpha male made sure that he had one platform all to himself!)

After walking around in the morning, we took an afternoon tour to Alcatraz.  Apparently they do an escape from Alcatraz swim once a year, so Jesse might force me to go back soon!    

Doesn't Jesse look pretty guilty here?

And I look waaay too happy to be in solitary confinement!

That evening, we took a sunset sail with beautiful views of the city and both the Golden Gate and Bay Bridges.

 

San Francisco has so much to offer and we really enjoyed our trip!