Where's the EASY Button?

Well, no scrappy post for me to share this week. I did make a card yesterday but didn't take a picture yet so I'll share that next week along with whatever else I manage to create. I haven't posted much outside of scrap & some pictures. There's been plenty going on but I haven't had the time or desired to make the time to post about it, and some of it really isn't all that interesting. I live in the mid south so I could whine talk about how the heat & humidity have trapped me indoors with the blessing that is air conditioning. Or I could talk about the sudden rain that comes & goes without leaving trace. A little more exiting would be the night we thought a tornado was coming & took cover in the laundry room - after Shawn & I admired the cloud rotations. Then there was another night with a severe thunderstorm that put on the most awesome lightening I've ever seen. A HUGE bolt of lightening hit ground about 100 yards behind our house (luckily it's an empty field), sadly a house on post was struck & caught fire but no one was hurt as far as I know. We were in awe & jumped at the sight of it, I would have loved to have caught that on camera.

Other things on my mind have been the turmoil that a certain well known couple is going though. I don't want to talk about it but my heart broke for J&K, even more for the 8. I read this post that is related to the story real life woes and I think he had the best there is to say about the whole situation. I highly recommend you click on the link and read it for yourself as well. I played Michael Jackson music much of the day Friday, mostly because I thought that is what my mom would have done if she was still here to hear the news. Man In The Mirror was her favorite song of his. He was a talented man who definitely left his mark & influence in the musical world. As for all of the other stuff surrounding him, only he & God know. I hope he has found peace.

Today I am still recovering from a hard choice I had to make yesterday. I was discouraged, disappointed and just down. It was a rough day. You know that feeling when you really want something? I mean really want it, and you think it's going to happen, you think it so much that you pretty much know it will happen? And then. It doesn't. Someone or something pretty much says "nope" and the rug is pulled out from under you and you fall hard on your rear bruising your tail bone and bumping your head all while a knot forms in your stomach. That's the disappointment I had yesterday. It doesn't really matter what the disappointment was but more of how I will choose to handle that disappointment. I could become bitter. I could get discouraged and give up all together. Or. I could pull the bootstraps back up, go on & start over. I could trust that making that hard choice was the right choice and that it's all part of the bigger picture and one day in the future I'll look back and say "I'm glad" for that hard decision. I will say that the hard choice had to do with submission (ouch!) and making a sacrifice (saltinthewound).

I have been writing and rewriting and saving a post about my mom as well. There was finally a trial and a verdict was reached and life goes on. I will be sharing soon, just need some more write & rewrite time.

I hope you are enjoying your weekend and summer! I've got housework before taking the kids to the pool today - assuming the weather cooperates, around here you never know. Oh & if you want to reminisce with some Michael Jackson I have quite a few songs in my play list. I will be updating that soon too, there are several songs that I love to dance to in my car while driving around town - doesn't everyone do that? And I think they would be fun to dance to while cleaning house too.

Some Scrap

I didn't get as much done this week as I thought I would. I missed out on a scrappy night with friends because I was too tired from not sleeping well the night before. So, no progress on Lydia's album but I did make two cards. I don't have any pictures to share because I didn't think of it until the envelopes were sealed. One of Shawn's aunts passed unexpectedly so I made two condolence cards borrowing a SU stamp set from my friend. It's a double mounted set called Thoughts & Prayers, it was perfect for the cards.

This week I would like to set aside some time in the evenings to finish up all of my mostly done pages in her album. There are several pages that need journaling & some that are missing embellishments. I would like them to all be done so I can move on & really feel like progress is being made on her album. I still haven't mailed cards out so I need to do that, though some will probably just go with me on my trip next month. I have a lot coming up in June so I'll be less focused on scrapping but do want to set some time aside for it so I don't abandon it all together again.

I hope everyone has a great week! For more scrappiness click the button above.

More Photo Catch Up

I had a little time this morning so here is a little more catch up on photo posting. One of these days I'll get around to a "real" post but for now this will do. :D There are waaay more picture from boating & other fishing trips Shawn & Michael have taken but this is a short summary. I think I need to open some kind of photo hosting account just to upload & share with family to log in rather than having to 'blog' everything. I'll figure that out one of these days. Anyhow, it'll keep the grandma's content for now. ;)

We all went out on the boat, had a fun time!

Shawn & Michael took a trip on the boat - just the boys!

Michael's last day of preschool! He's so grown up.

Our 4th wedding anniversary.

Kids playing on the swing.

{S}crappy

If I measure summer vacation by Sunday Scrappin I think summer is going to fly by. It already seems to be going so quickly. This week we had sporatic thunderstorms & lightening shows - typical around here but the days have been hot & mostly humid. Shawn has fished, we've taken the boat out, kids have enjoyed the free summer movie and I have been craftsy. I think my friends & I have gotten together at least once a week to scrap. It's been fun! I haven't been that regularly crafty since before moving out here when I'd visit my bff to scrap. I'm looking forward to more summer fun - splash park, water park, bbq, zoo, museums, dinosaur world and of course more crafty time.

So on with the post. Here are my tada's:

Here is another spread done for Lydia's album, well started anyway. As with most of my pages recentlyI still need the title, journaling & some embellishments. If you can't tell these are pictures of her crawling. When Michael started crawling he started walking about 2 weeks later - he was a booty scooting baby - so I didn't get many pictures of him crawling. I went a little overboard with Lydia as there are probably 20-50 other photos I could have used. :D I used my "darling dots" stamp to create the background on the white paper on the first page, almost exactly matches her jammies. I loved those pj's, they reminded me of something I could have worn as a baby.

I had another late night scrap with my friends - training in the field & staff duty do have their perks. ;) That night I only made cards. I did two pinked out Congrats cards for new team members, two "a note for you", one "love you a latte" and one "i stink you're sweet". I used 4 different stamp sets, a roller stamp & two misc stamps. I am really loving stamps.

I did start working on this week's challenge. I chose a layout of Christine's and did up a sketch for it but forgot about it after a couple of days so I'll have to do that this week.

Todo's:

If I can get 1-2 spreads a week done for Lydia's album I will be thrilled. I think that would put me finished with it before she turns 3. I want to go back & finish up details {journaling, title, embellishments} on incomplete pages this week.

Happy Flag Day! I know it's not a big holiday but it got us a four day weekend so I thought it deserved some recognition. To see what other scrappers have been up to click the link above. I hope you are enjoying summer!

Due to High Demand

So apparently my semi hiatus has been upsetting to some, troubling even. I have had several requests to post about our life & not just my {s}crap. Don't worry, the popularity isn't going to my head, the kids may get an ego boost though. See, it's only been my step mom asking for pictures of her grandkids. Every phone call she asks if I've blogged lately, other than scrapping. I kept telling her I would put some pictures up so here we go. I'll do at least one post a week with photos between my scrappy posts and maybe even a third organizational post of some sort. Also, I do have some news to share but am still writing the post up on all that...until then happy reading! {& pondering}

I tortured the kids with the camera one day before letting them fly kites & play with their sidewalk chalk. They took too long to "smile&lookatthecameraalready" and the wind died down but they still had fun with the chalk. I finally ordered some updated prints for the house - last of Lydia was when she was 3 months old - OVER two years ago. And I don't mean professional photo - no snapshot or anything. So that will be a project for the coming week.

The next day Shawn was having fun with Michael on the little rope swing. Yes, that is our tree that Michael is swinging into. I was a little concerned for his safety but still grabbed the camera before telling Shawn to stop before he fell and broke something - no time for a trip to the ER!

Sunday Scrappin 6 in a Row!

I am SO excited to be back again this week! I know I've been saying that on the last three posts at least but I am having so much fun getting craftsy on a regular basis & checking things off of my list of to-dos for Lydia's one year album.

I have made some scrappy new friends and that's been fun too. One of my friends is a demonstrator for Stampin' Up products and is hosting monthly get togethers and other crops throughout the month so that has been and will be great opportunities to scrap. A couple days ago my other new friend's husband had staff duty {an overnight shift} so the three of us got together after the kids were in bed & scrapped into the wee hours of the night, or morning since it was about 2am when I headed home. It was a late night but we had fun & I got quite a bit done!

Tadas: {I apologize for poor picture quality, my batteries were dieing so I didn't have time to play around with it.}

When Lydia was a baby I gave her baths in the sink because it was easier than bending over the tub using one of those baby bath seats. The first page has pictures of us bathing her in the bathroom sink of the hotel on post we lived in for one month before getting our house. The second page are photos from her taking a bath in our kitchen sink. Now she's much to big for the kitchen sink but when she gets into a bad mess I have stripped her down & cleaned her up quickly with the sprayer, she hasn't been into so many messes since then. ;) I still have the journaling and some embellishments to do.

After making the first spread I wanted to play with my new stamp set I got for hostessing my last party. I am having so much fun stamping!

Then I moved onto another spread. I still need the title, journaling & some embellishments for these pages. The first page is Lydia's first trip to the park a few days after she was born while Michael & M played {my best friend's youngest}, the second page is my two & her youngest again during a visit.

At this point I was starting to get tired & losing my creativity so I stopped working on pictures & started making cards. The first set says "celebrate one cupcake at a time!" - how cute is that? {I'm ahead on birthday cards now} The second set says "inspired, amazed, inspired {by you}" - these will be on hand for my team members as we celebrate their successes. The last 'set' say "because nice matters" & "take care of yourself".

Two spreads & four cards - not too shabby if I do say so myself! BUT I didn't get to this week's challenge of finishing up something - I have plenty of pages that need journaling but didn't get to it. Maybe I'll do this week's challenge. Even with all of my scrappiness I haven't done a single challenge.

Todos:

• Get solid card stock so I can scrap more pages
• Finish up these pages
  
• Scrap pages
• Mail off cards

I hope everyone had a great week! To check out other scrap happy people click the button above.