Patriotic Encouragement

Hey!!!  I hope everyone had a great 4th of July. It was pretty low key here as we are still recovering from our trip to visit my parents. I did make this card, but of course I'm late posting. I played along with the sketch at Die Cuttin Divas and the colors from the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge. I haven't used brads in ages, so it was fun to get those out. :)  Oh, and my corner rounder! Do you like pulling out those neglected tools and supplies sometimes? I do, but I need the motivation like this sketch to do it. My die cut is the star that was featured in one of the kits from Simon Says Stamps. I cut it out three times and pieced it together.

We had a nice visit to Kentucky. My dad was still in the hospital when we got there, but he was released the next day. He had been dealing with hospitalization at least once a week for a while, but he managed to stay healthy our whole trip. I'm thinking it was due to Laila's excellent nursing skills. She was so good with him. We weren't sure how she would handle him being so sick, but she was amazing. 

She had a great birthday. We had cupcakes on her actual birthday along with some gifts. The next day we took her to the Ripley's Aquarium in the Smoky Mountains. Then on Saturday she had her party at the local swimming pool. She loved being around all my family and getting all that attention.  It was hard for her to leave. :(  We are slowly trying to get back to our routine, but so far we've had a roof leak that we have to get fixed and soooo much rain!!