Make and Take Happiness

Today was Scrap'n Memories Anniversary Celebration and each of the teachers conducted a make-and-take for the customers. And boy, were there customers! It was so much fun to see the store covered up with people! My contribution was a hands-on with the Quickutz Revolution making this card:

The frame is made with the Nesting Squares die set and the balloons with a 4x4 die. Ink up the balloons with a touch of black ink on the edges for extra definition. Add string, pop dots, a sweet Daisy Bucket Clearly Petite stamp and round the corners for a quick card.

Stay tuned for the amped up version using ribbon and a few additional variations. Make and Takes are supposed to be simple and quick--a jumping off point--a demonstration of a tool or product. I always get so jazzed by the different ideas that people share while doing these little projects.

As an extra special treat I even got to meet Hollye of Hollye's Hobby blog. (Waving!)

Hope you are have a creative weekend!

HYBRID

So you may have noticed that there's a new(ish) term floating around the scrap community--"hybrid scrapbooking". This term refers to the marriage of traditional paper scrapbooking with computer-driven or digital scrapbooking elements.

It's something many people have been doing even without realizing. Photo manipulation (cropping and correcting), computer journaling, printing titles, making your own background paper (see my LO)--all "hybrid scrapbooking". Who knew?

The journaling for this layout is on the back of the page and is kinda personal so I'm not sharing it, but let me tell you, this child takes his "school" very seriously and it's been a sweet thing for me to watch him do take to the school model.

The little tags and brackets at the bottom are from a sticker sheet by Doodlebug Designs. (Love cardstock stickers).

There's a scrumptious Aussie blog showing off some hot Scenic Route right here. Get an eyefull.

I'm laying low for a bit. Stuff to do. Things to mourn. Hurts to get over. Tasks to accomplish. Boys to love. Fall to relish.

Can I just preach for a moment...don't underestimate the power of kind words. But in the same vein, even kind words mean nothing if they are insincere. Everyone likes to say "Didn't your moma teach you if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all"...but really, sometimes you need to say things that aren't necessarily *nice*. I know it's not a very southern way to think, but life is not about nice. My mom also taught me to be honest. Be real, but be kind. You can do both if your heart is in the right place.

And that's the news from Lake Woe-is-me... hope you are swell.

DUDE

a--drugs. pre-dentist and post-dentist...dude. I could so get used to the hazy life. if ya know...it wasn't um like...illegal and deadly. it was nice to sleep good.

a1--I am so grateful for a husband who knows the meaning of loving in the "in sickness" part of "in sickness and in health. He is so good at caring.

b--if you haven't visited Tina Cockburn's blog, today is the day. Don't miss her a-maz-ing fruity-licious photos today. I'm tellin' ya...ya just don't want to miss this.

c--scrapbook stores in this town (general vacinity) are droppin' like flies these days. Just this week, one closing was announced and I heard that another is for sale. I hate it for them. It's so important to support your LSS if you want them to stay around.

On that note, Scrapn' Memories is celebrating their first birthday this Saturday. If you stop by between 10 and 2, you'll be treated to a wonderful array of make-and-takes by all the Scrap'n Memories teachers (including myself) and other fun birthday things! I hope to see you there!

d--I'm starting a new blog. Check it out here.

e--I'm purging. Scrapbook stuff that is. If you would like "the box of unknown stuff", email me atscrappinsarah at msn dot com . It may be stuff you like. May not. It's a risk. It's just all sorts of stuff. Scrap and paper crafting stuff. I'm not taking the time to try and sell you on the contents. If you generally see yourself as a trash-to-treasure person, you'll like this. If your too high-falutin' for a garage sale, you'll probably want to pass on this. Anyway, the deal is, when you get the box, you take out what you like, add some stuff you no longer need and then post to your own blog to find the box a new home...and it goes on and on. Don't be a booger and keep the box. That's rude. I'll have to send you all sorts of junk mail if you are a booger. :)

f--There's a new baseball movie coming out this weekend..."Final Season". I'm stoked.

That's all for today.

A BLOG FUNNY

Click on the comic above to see it. It made me laugh.

Have you ever ripped a photo?

So you know that I have an intense love for tearing paper, right?

Including photo paper.

Torn photos...what a criminal act.

:)

Say a prayer for me on Monday, if you can--I'm going to the dentist. Before discovering sedation dentistry, I was tormented by the dentist. Now, it's downgraded to a just a necessary evil. With sedation, I take a pill the night before and two pills the morning of and sleep like a baby. No running back and forth for multiple appointments, no hairy anxiety, no pain. Come home and sleep it off for about twelve hours. I remember nothing. It's the only way to go, if you ask me.

Joal's home. (Those are two very sweet words.) He went to Dallas this week to record a training DVD for his company. I've been ribbing him about being a movie star...ahhh, yes, a man of many talents I am married to. LOL!

Happy World Card Making Day!

What's your favorite kind of chocolate?

PS I can't figure out what is making my blog posts be so sporadically spaced. I'm working on it.

THOUGHTS ABOUT the FUTURE of SCRAPBOOKING

I fell in love with these little felt pumpkins a while back at the craft store. The boys and I made magnets out of some of them but I snagged a few for card-making. (The finished size of the folded card above is 5.5" x 8.5", so you can tell, they are a good size. The striped paper is Scenic Route's newest...Ashville. De-lish.

I was surprised by how well I liked the pale blue background. Pale blue isn't usually what I think of when I see pumpkins...until now. :)

In other news, Noell Hymen of the Paperclipping blog posted some thoughts about acid-free scrapbooking yesterday. This, in particular, jumped out at me:

We take more pictures than any generation before us.
We document more events, feelings, thoughts, and stories than ever before.
If some of the pages don’t withstand the years because of periodic acidic
items, our children and grandchildren will still inherit many more
well-preserved photos than what we’ll get (or got) from our parents.

For most people, I think she's right on the money. The birth of consumer-friendly (easy and affordable for even novice photographers) digital cameras and home-printing systems has changed the face of personal and family photography, especially in the last ten years and nowhere is this more true than among scrapbookers. Since going digital in 2006, I have taken more than ten thousand images. (Luckily, I've only printed a small fraction of those.) The freedom to snap off twenty shots in hopes of getting one good one--one that is worthy of scrapbooking--is amazing and creatively liberating, in a way that I never suspected it would be. There is no "film commitment" to worry about and deleting excess is as easy as 2 clicks.

Becasue of this ability to be selective with what I save and what I print, I have more photos to choose from, and by extension, more photos to scrapbook and store. In the pre-digital days, I would be lucky to get 2-5 great shots per roll of film and to find them, I had to have the entire roll printed. Now, I only print what I love and plan to scrapbook. Where I was previously getting only 2-5 scrap-worthy photos per roll...now 100% of what I print is scrap-worthy. Think of the $$ saved!

However, how does this apply to the future of scrapbooking? I agree with Noell that my children will likely inherit far more photos and scrapbooks than anyone in my family ever has, for a variety of reasons. But what if they don't want them? What if, despite my attempts at brainwashing, my sons don't care about "Mom's hobby" and what it yields? What if there are so many volumes of scrapbooks documenting their childhoods and lives, that they find it overwhelming and inconvenient to have the scrapbooks and albums? How would I feel if I were in their shoes?

It seems pretty easy for me to rack up a single scrapbook of every one to two years of our lives. The average lifespan of a woman in America is a nice round 73 years. If I end up on the same pace, I will leave behind at least 36.5 albums! Do I really want to burden my sons with that many volumes...

Stay tuned.

THE GREATS

Who do you think of when some mentions " the great American authors"?

Twain

Faulkner

Frost

Whitman

Hemmingway

Steinbeck

Sandburg

Cather

Dickinson

Emerson

Wealty

Hawthorne

Sinclair

Well, those have their merits, but for my money, the Miriam brothers, (Noah) Webster and (Peter) Roget are "the greats", although technically Roget is British. I would certainly be inept without them. I have had these two books--the dictionary and the thesaurus--since high school. Yes, they are yellowed and showing signs of extreme wear (notice the missing covers) but I love them. I keep them handy, on the bookshelf behind my seat and I use them both several times a day.

I use spell-check but I love the feel of flipping thru an actual dictionary and searching for the proper spelling of a word. Sometimes it's a hunt. Sometimes I confirm my own suspicions. I especially love going to a library where there's a huge, unabridged dictionary. I used to get a kick out of telling Julian "the library has a dictionary that weighs more than you do", although that's no longer true so I had to stop. Apparently, the dictionary is growing at a slower pace than one son. :)

I

would like to do a dictionary scrapbook someday, with specialized definitions as the journaling.

So, now you know.

2Peas PROMPT

The 2Peas promt of the day is:
When making a layout, do you always need a title?

In short, yes. To me the title is vital because it draws the reader into the page. To me, a good title makes you want to read the rest of the page.

I like bold titles. I can't think of any layouts I've done without some kind of title.

So now you know.

CARD FOR PINK CROP

Scrapbook stores across the country are scrapping pink this weekend to raise money and awareness for breast cancer.

My favorite local scrap store participated and I volunteered to do a Quickutz make & take for the croppers last night. This was a secondary version of the card we made. The only difference in this and the actual card we made was the QK font--I made the sample for the store, prepared the kits and then completely forgot to make one for myself--so when I got home I had to improvise with the fonts I have. The store's card used Zoe, which I really liked. My version uses the Blossom Mini.

And, I added ribbon. Of course.

The flourish on the lower part of the card is a Revolution die--one of the 4x4 dies.

In other news, I have Scenic Route paper from the Ashville Collection in my hot little hands and yes, it delightful. Can't wait to use it!

The boys and I are making felt pumpkin magnets to day and they are all amped to get crafting.

Happy Saturday!

IF I HAD $385K

So if I had $385,000 this is what I would do with it.

So now you know.

BOYS.

At least once a day in our house, the following can be heard, usually in a loud voice:

"Stop pounding on the floor with your brother!"

Muttered under breath:

"You're going to kill each other."

Can someone explain why this is? They do this wrestling-tickling-laughing-running-competitive-physical smack-down that (because our house is not on a slab) sounds like something horrible is going on, judging from the noises of floor impact. (Thankfully, we have carpet, right.)

It's pure boy craziness for a good 30 minutes, usually in the afternoon. As long as no one is getting hurt, I try to stay out of it. It's always surprising how well G holds his own against his brother, despite his 40 pound/24 inch disadvantage.

They get sweaty, and run out of steam so then we start baths and things go back to calm and collected.

I'm thinking of putting a boxing ring in the back yard.

FEELING BETTER

And BOOM! It feels like fall. The high for today is a luxurious 80 degrees. Sweet relief!

I had a right miserable weekend but I'm feeling better mostly now. I missed church and 2 meetings that were important to me...I hate being sick. One of the meetings I missed was the presentation of a new water filtration system at the local middle school in memory of my neighbor who was murdered just over a year ago. Our neighborhood and the family and friends of Mary Sadler collected money for a memorial and I am pleased that it turned out so beautifully. The local news media covered the small ceremony as did our community paper. (I'll add links to the Westview paper site when their site is updated.)

The task force that I was part of for this project originally intended to place a bench at our local park with a small plaque on it. I was shocked at the limitless amount of permissions and red tape one has to go thru to seat a bench in the park. It was crazy. So, through the diligence of one of the other members of the task force, we were able to find a different route for our memorial. The local middle school library was badly in need of a water filtration system and fountain. Apparently, the quality of the water at the school is sub-standard (go figure that out) but in conjunction with the generous donation of one of the local water filtration companies, (I need a link) we were able to provide this for the students and faculty, along with a plaque and photo of our neighbor.

Participating in this project has been a very meaningful thing to me. I hated to miss the ceremony but it seems to have gone off without a hitch. I'm so glad.

In other news, I'm going to be teaching a class at Scrap'n Memories (in Nashville) on Saturday October 27 at 2pm. The name of the class is *Don't you Love Scenic Route*! Fitting, don't you think? Photos of the class projects will be forth-coming.

ARROW PUNCH

PS Does anyone have this punch and have interest in selling me 50 punchies in black Bazzill?

Email me if so.

Thank you.

SICK

My head feels like it weighs fifty pounds and my chest feels like it has a gorilla sitting on it. The boys gave me a cold...bless their little hearts.

I'm going to bed.
For a year.

GARAGE SALE FINDS

Only had time for one garage sale today but it was a good one--and a benefit for the elephant sanctuary as well. :) I found this awesome little cookbook from 1963...it's Betty Crocker's Cooky Book and it's in excellent condition. And it was a buck.

I distinctly remember oogling this book at the library when I was a in grade school. The pictures in it are fabulous. And the recipes...

The other "find" was a boat-load of National Geographic magazines. Those are like gold for home schooling and pre-k people who like to make collages.

Continuing the vacation story, Joal's company had their annual do-something-fun-on-Saturday-night-after-the-big-meeting shindig at the Dallas World Aquarium. It's always neat to hang out with people from all over the country who do what Joal does and get to know them and their families. That's one of the things I love most about this company--they are very familial.

One of Joal's counterparts for NWYC in the Northeast is a man who came here from Nigeria more than 20 years ago. He one of the top salesmen and I had the pleasure of meeting he and his wife on the first cruise. Fast forward to early in the summer, and we got word that B had taken some time off to take his family to Nigeria for a visit--the first time he'd been back. And then later we got word that he had been detained in Nigeria and while his family was allowed to return to the states, he was being hassled about some paperwork. According to the Nigerian system, the paperwork they claimed he needed in order to return to the states would take 8 month to a year to process. The Nigerians confiscated his passport and told him to wait.

Being active and vocal in our government is what NWYC encourages all Americans to do...and it's what the home office team did on behalf of B, with efficiency and dedication. The president of the company and the team in Washington DC started contacting people in places who could get this fixed and within a few weeks B was back on American soil. NWYC people were praying and working on his behalf and God used them to make this happen.

On Sunday, we picked up the boys from my parents and drove home to TN.

Some of you may not know that my husband is a classically-trained, degreed musician and his real job gets in the way of his passion most of the time. He loves NWYC (and has for all his 9 years), but he loves music too. He writes and sings and plays guitar. I have come to refer to his music as "thinking-man's folk music". The stuff he writes is not brainless fluff--it's thoughtful--you have to pay attention to get it. If I had to compare him to someone it would be David Wilcox. Very observational and of course, guitar driven.

Joal recorded two inde albums while we were in college...many many moons ago. (Guess who did the cover art?)

So why am I telling you this? Yesterday was a big day. He finally got to spend a few hours in a studio laying down 14 songs. It's so stinking cool to have his newest stuff on disc...and on my computer now too! It's quite raw and gritty and I love it.

SHOES?

Does this look like it could be an instrument of death and destruction to you?

Amazing!

See HERE.

LAYLE'S at it AGAIN

There's new Scenic Route on Layle's BLOG!

LYRICS I LIKE

Found this picture of Andy today, that he uploaded to his myspace page ten days ago. His internet time has been so limited lately he hadn't had time for myspace so I quit checking it for a while. Somehow I missed this. I wish for more pictures every day and then I get one and it creates such turmoil. I have questions but no one to ask. There's worry in the pit of my stomach that I can't even begin to put words to. I listen intently to the news on the radio hoping simultaneously that there will be some mention of the goings on in AFG and praying that there is nothing newsworthy happening there.

There is only one comfort. The same God that walks me thru every day on this side of the planet is the exact God who knows the precise valley where my brother is on patrol on the other side of the planet. While it feels like he's a million miles away, we look up and take in the sight of the very same moon and stars. I pray for him and I know God hears my prayers. As Joni Erikson Tada wrote: "There is never a place where He is not."

I know this song (recorded by Dierks Bentley) was written as a romantic love song, but I think it could be read with a different meaning as well. As you read it, think of it as I do--as a song from God to each one of us--whether on the banks of the Cumberland or on the other side of the planet in an Afghani valley, and all points in between.
__________________________________________________

"My Love Will Follow You"

Take your suitcase and take your heart
Take a train to the boulevard
My love will follow you, my love will follow you
You can try to lose yourself downtown
You can burn all your bridges down
My love will follow you, yeah my love will follow you

My love will follow you
Down every highway of your soul
You can leave me far behind
But my love will be your shadow

Everywhere you go
So close the door, turn in the key
Leave me here like a memory
My love will follow you, my love will follow you

Even on a road that takes you down where
Cords of human kindness come unwound
My love will follow you, yeah my love will follow you
If you should go so far, that you cannot get back
You may not remember, but my heart will not lose track
So go ahead and take that train
In my heart you'll still remain

My love will follow you, my love will follow you
My love will follow you
Oh, follow you
My love will follow you

SEEMS LIKE IT SHOULD BE FRIDAY

The weekend went by so fast...seems like it should still be Friday here. So where to start. The men and I took off on Wednesday of last week to my parents, on our way to Joal's annual company meeting in Dallas. Arrived at the meeting on Thursday. The boys and I dropped him off at the gorgous Richardson Hotel and then we hit ReCollections! Can I just say...WOW! What a loaded store. I've never seen a store with so much old and new stuff. Excellent selection of albums...that always impresses me. Great displays and a superb collection of cardstock. It was easy to spend there. My only complaint is that it's aisles were only 1 person wide, so I was feeling a little crowded, with my guys in tow.

ReCollections was among the first chain scrap stores to be built in Texas. I visited the first one (not this one) a few years back, when it first opened. It was nice then...but nothing like this.

We spent about two hours there, got some lunch and headed back to my parents. On Friday, we hung out with Nana and Pawpaw (my parents). After lunch, I needed to find a Post Office so we went out for a ride. Wouldn't ya know it, there was a scrapbook store right across the street from the little post office in Nash, Texas.

Scrapbooker's Emporium was a very nice store and is (I think) the only free-standing, non-house scrapbook store I've ever seen. Neat place. Not many samples but a great sale on my favorite adhesive tape, an overflowing discount bin of stickers to bribe certain boys with and the newest Technique Tuesday stamps! As I later told my honey, when one finds her favorite adhesive on sale, one must indulge, ya know. :) Needless to say, I'm good on adhesive for a while.

On Friday evening we grilled hamburgers with my parents and grandmother and had a lovely time. The boys gave my dad a workout when they discovered he could and would push them around my grandmother's h-u-g-e backyard in the wheelbarrow.

On Saturday, I left early and went to Dallas alone for some shopping and resting. For the longest time I have wanted to visit IKEA, and Saturday morning, I did. I have to say, I was a little underwhelmed. Now that I have seen it, I can easily shop online. I don't know...it just seemed like a Pier One on steroids. My love of graphic and sleek does not extend to furniture. I'm more of a handmade, antiquities kinda girl than I thought, apparently. I enjoyed seeing it and found a great deal on small glass pitchers and some finger puppets for my Sunday School class.

After IKEA (which only took an hour), I managed to find (with the genius of Karen) three more scrapbook stores. The Scrap Bucket is a cool place where I found some wonderful samples displayed. The Scrap Bucket features hundreds of little tin buckets in the middle of the store, filled with items that are usually sold in packages, unpackaged so they can be purchased individually. So instead of buying an entire alphabet in the KI HeartFelt Letters, you can pick thru and buy only the letters you want, at a slightly higher piece price. In theory, this is a good idea but I don't go into a scrapbook store with layouts in mind...so I have no idea what letters I will need. I only spent three dollars there. The buckets were a little overwhelming and I am not one to dig. I did, however, ask to take a photo of this layout, that I thought was totally excellent:

Note the Scenic Route!

I did notice that The Scrap Bucket logo seems a little close, design-wise to the logo of another famous bucket store. Odd.

Next I ventured to The Scrap Spot, a small store near the hotel. I have visited The Scrap Spot in years past. It's very crowded and all the racking and shelves sit right on the floor--a pet peeve of mine. It's divided by theme and has a "bucket" section too. The woman who works there is very friendly. I did notice that not much had changed since I was there back in November. The sign always throws me off. I looks like it ought to be the sign of an ice cream parlor.

If you go to Dallas looking for a store called Scrapbook University...don't bother. Apparently it has closed. Or moved.

After all my shopping, I got some Chinese food and headed back to the hotel. I'm not sure if I ordered wrong of if the Chinese place goofed up my order but I ended up with what I think was Shrimp in Lobster Sauce when I thought I ordered Sweet and Sour Shrimp, but by the time I discovered it I was back at the hotel in my jammies, so I just picked the shrimp out and ate some of the broth and the rice. I spent the rest of the afternoon piled up in the hotel room napping and taking a nice long shower before getting ready for the evening.

Stay tuned for part two later on tonight!

We Do Not Forget 9/11/2001

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jzzzwzzzu, jjgjjffjftduifr676r7t5y6 gofode8ur'hu-k

______________________
Well, sorry about that. The above was brought to you by my guest blooger, G-man. I started the post, left it unattended while the photos loaded and then of course, forgot about it. This morning (Tuesday) when I got back to ye ol' blog, there it was. I inquired of Julian, and he ratted his brother out.

Booger. Send the boy to pre-K and he thinks he can take over the blog. :)

Anyway, the top picture is of my favorite flowers in my kitchen.

The second is a layout I finished after the crop on Saturday. It's a total scraplift from a pea. Here's the original by namturemomm at 2Peas. With this layout, I used a new ink pad--Colorbox Fluid Chalk in Dark Brown. It's a "cat eye" and oh my...it's so juicy and smoothe. Talk about easy inking!

It also uses my new set of QK Frankie Skinni Mini. Love those!

The third photo is my friend Michele, who was at the crop I went to in Hendersonville on Saturday. She's a Creative Memories Consultant. It was good to see her again and see all the new items that CM is coming into the current century with. They really are doing some nice stuff. I like the concept of the Picfolio...and the punchie-lover in me is drawn to some of their newest punches.

I also got to sit with Debbi. It was good to catch up. I'm looking forward to our Scrap Night at home!

In other news, I think I'm over the cropping frenzy. It seems I can never pack adequately (I always forget something vital--this time it was my trimmer and brown Bazzill) and something odd/awkward always happens to me.

This time it was an awkward situation regarding the items I had on the yard sale table. Another cropper approached me and said she didn't have any money but she really wanted some punches I was selling for super cheap. I said I would accept a check (it was $12). She said she didn't have her checkbook. She said she lived down the street and asked if I lived nearby. I don't (I drove about 28 miles to the crop). She asked if I was coming to the crop at ___ church. I said no. I'm still not sure what she wanted me to do. I don't even know her name...but how does one expect to shop--even at a yard sale table--without money? I'm still a little baffled by it.

It was a nice crop, overall. The positives:

• The inside of the fascility was great for scrapbooking.
• The lunch was 3 kinds of lasagna--a wonderful deviation from the usual pizza
• The spa treatments looked delighful (and were included in the price of the crop)
• No music
• Quite a few door prizes and I was lucky enough to win 2--one from the CTMH consultant that was very cool

The challenges:

• I have a feeling that the vendor to scrapper ratio was way out of whack.
• The steps in the front were challenging, bordering on dangerous (not the fault of the crop planners, just an observation)
• The bathroom had short potties and short salloon-style swinging doors placed way too high and too close to the pottie. Talk about something obviously designed by a man who has never sat to pee. :) If the need to go hadn't been so imperritive, I would have waited.

So now you know.

HAVE YOU EVER NOTICED...?

Have you ever noticed that "Nuthin'" is always "Somethin'"?
With children.
And it's usually a bigger somethin' than the person who claims to be doing nuthin' thinks.
If I have one nugget of parental advice (and really I shouldn't), it's this.
Nuthin' equals Somethin'
Always.

Me from another room: "What are you doing?"
Boy in different room: "Nuthin'"
Me: "What are you doing nuthin' with?"
Boy: "Ummm."
Insert extended silence.

Like snipping the ends off an entire box of popsicles at once, for the express purpose of seeing what color was inside and being able to pick the desired color.
Or seeing what happens when one throws a plastic fork into the ceiling fan.
Or _______.

I'm sure this could be a very long list.
:)

BIG WEEK...But NO ONE IS SMILING

This is a common site in our freezer. It's Daddy's favorite dessert--Purity Heavenly Hash Frozen Yogurt. He puts bananas on top of his bowl of yogurt in some sort of amusing effort to make it healthy...LOL! So with this in mind, you can imagine how amped Julian was to go on a homeschool group field trip to the Purity Dairy, where Daddy's favorite concoction is made. It was pretty neat, so he says...and I have to agree. The line was producing 4-ounce cups of vanilla for schools and hospitals today...



The plant tour includes a sample cup of ice cream...now that's what I call a great home school field trip! And yet, curiously, he wouldn't smile--not even while eating his own favorite--strawberry yogurt.

While we were on the tour I forgot to ask my two questions:
a) do people who work on the line still like ice cream?
b) what are some of the flavors that have been rejected?

Field Trips are my favorite part of home schooling. Our next one is to a bakery.



On a completely different note, would anyone care to take a guess at what these bags contain?

Clothing.
My clothing.
Going to The Salvation Army Donation Place.
Because they are too BIG.

My closet is sufffering from a severe lack of content, but I couldn't be any happier. Included in these bags are 3 pairs of pants that I had to stop wearing, lest they quite literally fall down. Isn't that an awesome problem to have?! Weight and health are such a struggle for me, but as I have noted in the past, a little bit of success breeds a great deal of success, for which I am completely grateful.

And of course, it means new clothing. Which means shopping. That I may actually enjoy.

This is Mr. Too Cool on the first day of Pre-K. I could have more easily coaxed a smile from a president on Mt Rushmore than gotten a nice smile out of him on Tuesday. He was all about the buisness of Pre-K and in no mood for the mom-arazzi.



Luckily in the afternoon he was a tad more agreeable. :)

In personal scrapbooking news, I'm going to be participating in the design team and teaching a class or two in the near future at Scrapn' Memories, my (l)ocal (s)crapbook (s)tore. The last time I taught in a LSS, was just after Grey was born (did I mention he's now 4.5?) so I'm looking forward to getting back to something I love. I'm in good company: Dana Beckman, Chelle Green, Jessica Turner, Mary Ann Rhodes, Pam Byrd, Christine Long, Jill Barrett and Gretchen Owens.

And I'm going on a trip to Dallas in a few weeks and planning to take in three stores and IKEA, while I'm there. You can count on a report.

And finally, my letter to the editor of our small community paper was published this week. You can read here, if you want.

And CC to my sister: you can read about the mall progress here, but only until Saturday.


May all your clothing fit nicely and

may all your ice cream be yummy!

Happy Thursday!

PRAYERS of PEACE

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
when there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.

Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand,
to be loved as to love;

For it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

SQUEEKY CLEAN

The peas gallery has been ripe with squeeky clean and graphic layouts and projects lately...so much so that I've added some new people to my ever growing list of favorites. Thought I might share some with you:

STEPHPEA (had a LO of the day this week) She does some digital work that would translate into paper really well.

TERIISHERE I'm ga ga over her clean and funky style. This LO is one of my faves of hers. It's one that shows (again) how important it is to get the story behind the photo.

ROREE Her use of beutiful brilliant color is amazing and she uses Scenic Route often.

WINKS Her style is the ultimate in stark museum boldness, which I like very much. Very New Yorker in my mind.

NATUREMOMM I could copy everything in her gallery and be happy.

And finally This LO by bodil using chipboard scrolls as waves made me want to get out those cruise beach photos and try again with them. I love this idea. Totally. It's unexpected and resourceful.



In other news, I used some older Scenic Route on this layout yesterday. I'm loving these wallet photo sizes, too. (The background green is from K&Co Addison.) Mossy Oak is a brand of camo.

I hope you have a great weekend!

RESPECT

Respect
Author Unknown

The average age of the military man is 19 years.

He is a short haired, tight-muscled kid who, under normal circumstances is considered by society as half man, half boy. Not yet dry behind the ears, not old enough to buy a beer, but old enough to die for his country.

He never really cared much for work and he would rather wax his own car than wash his father's; but he has never collected unemployment either. He's a recent High School graduate; he was probably an average student, pursued some form of sport activities, drives a ten year old jalopy, and has a steady girlfriend that either broke up with him when he left, or swears to be waiting when he returns from half a world away.

He listens to rock and roll or hip-hop or rap or jazz or swing and 155mm Howitzers. He is 10 or 15 pounds lighter now than when he was at home because he is working or fighting from before dawn to well after dusk.

He has trouble spelling, thus letter writing is a pain for him, but he can field strip a rifle in 30 seconds and reassemble it in less time in the dark.

He can recite to you the nomenclature of a machine gun or grenade launcher and use either one effectively if he must. He digs foxholes and latrines and can apply first aid like a professional.

He can march until he is told to stop or stop until he is told to march. He obeys orders instantly and without hesitation, but he is not without spirit or individual dignity. He is self-sufficient. He has two sets of fatigues: he washes one and wears the other. He keeps his canteens full and his feet dry.He sometimes forgets to brush his teeth, but never to clean his rifle. He can cook his own meals, mend his own clothes, and fix his own hurts.

If you're thirsty, he'll share his water with you; if you are hungry, his food. He'll even split his ammunition with you in the midst of battle when you run low.

He has learned to use his hands like weapons and weapons like they were his hands. He can save your life - or take it, because that is his job.

He will often do twice the work of a civilian, draw half the pay and still find ironic humor in it all. He has seen more suffering and death then he should have in his short lifetime. He has stood atop mountains of dead bodies, and helped to create them.

He has wept in public and in private, for friends who have fallen in combat and is unashamed.He feels every note of the National Anthem vibrate through his body while at rigid attention, while tempering the burning desire to 'square-away' those around him who haven't bothered to stand, remove their hat, or even stop talking. In an odd twist, day in and day out, far from home, he defends their right to be disrespectful.

Just as did his Father, Grandfather, and Great-grandfather, he is paying the price for our freedom.

Beardless or not, he is not a boy. He is the American Fighting Man that has kept this country free for over 200 years.

He has asked nothing in return, except our friendship and understanding.

Remember him, always, for he has earned our respect and admiration with his blood.

For our Military "Lord, hold our troops in your loving hands. Protect them as they protect us. Bless them and their families for the selfless acts they perform for us in our time of need. Amen."

Amen.

FALL?

It's Fall? No not quite. At least not around these parts. Sure, school has started but unfortunately, school no longer signals the beginning of fall. It's still summer here but the pea prompt for today was to list some fall goals. Here are mine/ours:

--Spend time outside. We have been so shut up in the house due to the extreme heat that we are all in desperate need of some quality outside time the minute this heat breaks.

--School...for G and J--and possibly for me. I'm considering a creative writing class. I need something new.

--There may be a teaching opportunity on the horizon. If so, I'm going to embrace that for all I am worth. I have missed it.

Those are the new goals. There are always regular things I can do better--be a better mother, be more consistent with my Diabetic care (ugh), work on the house, stop procrastinating and stop being unfocused. Get a new attention span...LOL! Read more.

Did you see Tracie Claiborne's blog today? She used some of the lovely new Scenic Route papers! I'm trying to be patient

So I got an interesting piece of mail today that confirmed something I already knew but was trying to live in denial about--apparently I go to Kroger too often. The proof: Kroger sent me a little coupon book and on the cover it says "For one of our favorite customers..." Inside there are a bunch of coupons for things I buy most often and a $15 off coupon. Fifteen dollars. Now, that, my friends, is a coupon. :)

And finally, my honey visited the used CD store last week (like almost every week) and came home with a few new musical lovelies--one for me--Darryl Worley's 2004 CD called (get this) Darryl Worley. LOL! Every time I see his name I think about "my other brother Darryl" from Newhart. Anyway, it's the one that has "Aweful Beautiful Life". I do like that song. In a country girl sorta way. Let's face it--musical genius is not generously spread about in country music but I like it anyway. Sometimes. I digress. Sorry. There's a line in that song that speaks to me:

"You can't really smile until you shed some tears."

Happy Thursday.

SHARE & TELL ALBUMS

Have you seen this "new" product from Pebbles? It's the Share & Tell Album set. I say "new" because it's not a new concept...just a new offering from Pebbles in my Pocket. This concept, which I think is very smart, could be carried out with any photo album, of any size.

I love this concept. Photos go into an album followed by journaling and minimal embellishment as needed on 4x6 cards. The journaling slides right into the album, alongside the photos. Speaking of E-a-s-y! Think of it as "scrapbooking-lite".

I love scrapbooking. I don't ever plan to be finished, not do I plan to scrapbook every photo. It's just not a realistic goal. I do, however, want to keep my pictures orgnized and safe. I want to be able to find a specific photo easily and all it's companions quickly, should I want to scrpbook it. This is the perfect plan for an alternative scrapbook. The boys love to look at all the pictures, not just the scrapped ones.

I'm really glad to see a scrapbook company like Pebbles embracing the concept of sb-lite. I think one of the aspects of this hobby that makes it un-appealing to new people is the myth that every photo has to be scrapbooked immaculately and that if you aren't "caught up" you are somehow less of a good scrapbooker.

Pebbles and I have a long history. (Read about Pebbles history here.) When we lived in Mississippi in 1995/1996 and I was just getting into scrapbooking, Pebbles in my Pocket was a small store in Utah that offered a mail order catalog. Oh man...what bliss that was. I was worse than a kid with the Sears Toybook when the quartely PIMP (snort) catalog came in the mail. (Remember, Mississippi = scrapbook no man's land.) They called is a magalog because it was part catalog and part magazine. Pebbles introduced me to my very first scrapbooking "crush"--Brenda Cosgrove.

One of my goals (since the beginning) has been to go to Utah (the sb Mecca) and take a class with Brenda Cosgrove at PIMP. For me, she has always been the mother of clean. Design-wise, she took a detour into cute but she's always embraced clean lines and lovely layouts. It's been cool to watch Pebbles grow from just a store to a mail-order business (now a web store), a manufacturer, and the home of quite a few extrememly talented designers, including some second generation women coming into their own--like Brenda's daughter, Courtney.

Pebbles Halloween Card Gallery
Pebbles Fall Gallery
Pebbles Weekly Make n Take Inspiration

So now you know.

It's OFFICIAL. I AM SPOILED.

I've been finding it difficult to cook lately. My stove is out of commission (top is fine), I'm taking a medication that inhibits absorption of food and appetite, so I am rarely hungry, and it's so dang hot. Who cooks when it's hot? Not I.

Boy, doesn't that sound like a laundry list of excuses.

Honestly, the stove have been OOC for a while now and I don't even care. We grill outside about every other day, so there's just no missing the stove.

Except that my honey loves roasted turkey. (Big sigh) The man loves "Thanksgiving Dinner" all thru the year. In fact, if I had to guess, I would say that his most favorite meal is "Thanksgiving Dinner" (or mahi mahi)--I think. Unfortunately, not having an operational oven has put the roasted turkey menu on indefinite hold. While I suppose I could grill turkey, like grilled chicken, it just hasn't been appealing.

Continuing on, yesterday I discovered that Kroger sells fresh roated turkey breasts in the deli (where the roasted chickens are). Why haven't I thought of this earlier? What a wonderful find! We had roasted turkey, rolls, veggies and salad for lunch today and I declare...I am a spoiled woman. I may never actually cook turkey again. No muss, no fuss, no mess. No oven needed. It was juicy and wonderful and, of course, there's enough leftover for dinner!

Spoiled, I tell you. :)

Gonna be a big week. The G-man braved getting 4 shots last week and is prepped to the 9s for school. The parent meeting is Tuesday night. Open house is Thursday. School opens the following Tuesday. He's so psyched. I, on the other hand, have all sorts of jitters. So it goes.

In other news, I am going to a crop in Hendersonville on (Sat) Sept 8 and there are (I think) a few spots still open. Anyone want to join me? I'll be packing a few page kits to keep me busy and I have some things for the yard sale table. I haven't been to a crop since ...January? That can't be right. Can it? (I don't know.)

Happy Sunday!

Crafty Assignment of the Day

Crafty Assignment of the Day:
Organize all the clear stamps (and a few unmountedred rubber ones too).

I had several new sets of Technique Tuesday stamps that had to be unpackaged, put into CD cases, and make the index print of them (photo copy at 50%).

I had to clean some well-loved ones and get them back into the right case. And my clear blocks were in need of some serious cleaning, soI was glad to get that done.

It feels nice to have this little project accomplished.

Happy Saturday.

WHAT's THAT NOISE?

What's that noise? Outside, eminating from the sky? Booming? Seems familiar...but it's been so long. Could it be thunder? (Here's hoping...) Yes, I'm blogging about the weather again. Sorry.

In other news, yes, that layout you see in the opening of my post has--yes, count them--six photos!! SIX! Don't anyone get hurt falling in the floor!

Six wallet prints...what a neat way to sumarize all (or much) of what we did this summer. Hand-written journaling, too. This is a piece of the Scenic Route background collection...it makes handwriting right on the layout so easy. And the sun, in the upper left corner is a punch that just happened to be the perfect size to fit inside the stamped image. I love that kind of lucky. The stamp is from Danielle Johnson's Art Warehouse line, which I really like. (Old news.) It's obviously not a sun, per se, but I thought it made a nice one anyway. If it didn't look like a sun to you, you don't have to tell me. Don't shatter my delusion, please.

Wanna hear something funny? We had to have our new Jeep serviced this week and have some AC work done. There was a weird smell coming from the AC vents when it was on. Verdict: a "varmin" died in there. "A while back". I made him stop before he told me exactly what the "varmin" was...I could have lived my whole life without that knowledge. First off, it's just gross. And second, I would think of said "varmin" everytime I use the AC...and I use the AC year round. That would be this month's re-do, if I had one. A certain husband would have kept that bit of info to himself. And I would have cried if he had said it was "Chippie", the local baby chipmunk, who lives under our house. So, yes, I'm choosing to remain in the dark.

May all your stamps do double duty and may your AC always smell un-Varmin-like. :)

PS Those felt letters on the layout are by KI Memories. I don't recommend paying full price for them, as cute as they are. The "adhesive" on them does not work. Sadness. You would think that an industry that has every conceivable adhesive at it's fingertips, could manage to use adhesives that actually work on products that need to be stuck. Or here's a clue: no adehsive necessary. I will still buy them and use my own adhesive--my favorite adhesive that I know works.

Oh my, it's raining!!

ANDY'S MUG

These were taken in April when he was home, before deploying to AFG.

LITTLE THINGS ARE REALLY BIG THINGS

Would you indulge me in a little PSA about something that I care deeply about right now?

My little (term used loosely) brother is currently serving in the most remote area of Afghanistan in the US Army. He called home tonight for the first time in 2 weeks and one of the things he said was to thank my mom profusely for sending a large box of the Crystal Light To Go packets for bottled water. He said those little packets were worth gold right now because it's so indescribably hot there (it get up past 115 regularly) and they have to consume so much water to survive. He was so grateful and of course he's sharing them with his buddies so they are going fast. He wasn't going to ask her to send more--he never asks for stuff from home, he is just happy with whatever we send--but she assured him we would send more ASAP.

It's not really like my brother to gush unless it's a really big deal. He's a soldier in the truest sense of the word. He is a little too proud for his own good sometimes.

I have to tell you, I take those little packets for granted. We have been buying one or two a week for convenience since they came out. It's $4 for 14 and each one flavors one bottled water. Spoiled. I know. But not anymore.

So here's the PSA. If you know a soldier, please consider sending a box or two (or ten) of these little refreshments to him or her, especially if he or she is deployed to a hot zone. It's a very simple process to mail things and this small token from home will mean a whole lot. If you don't know a soldier, I can point you to a couple of projects that collect items for soldiers, or you can send it to me and I will send it to him for his section.

This is not a solicitation. It's a call to action. Let's not forget in our day-to-day rush that there are husband and wives and brothers and sisters serving and protecting the call of freedom in lands far and near--in lands much hotter than the 99 degrees that it got to in Tennessee today and with far less of the luxuries that we so easily take for granted. It's a simple thing that anyone can do. Please. Take the time to make a difference in just this simple, easy-to-accomplish way.

(If you need help with the process, email me. I'll be glad to walk you through it.)
Thank you for indulging me.

Sarah <--- a proud and prayerful PFC Army Airborne Medic's sister!