Feeling Scrappy and another James moment

Scrappy in a good way though! For the first time in two weeks I felt like opening up Photoshop in the afternoon instead of just taking my (now normal) nap. Maybe I'm doing the digi version of nesting? Looking around my house I think a more traditional nesting might be in order, but since my sciatica is getting worse the lower this baby drops, sitting on my behind in my comfy chair is a lot more appealing. Plus, I have online commitments... yeah, that's it!

Templates have become my friend lately since the basic design is all set out for me, which saves valuable brain cells that would otherwise get fried trying to decide where to put everything, and Sahlin Studio's templates are all on sale right now. For the first page I started with a template from the In Review: Modern set, although you might not recognize it now because it kind of evolved as I went.

I can't believe a year and a half has already gone by since these photos were taken. Peter has definitely lost that baby look, as well as most of his hair. Apparently we hadn't discovered the many benefits of the buzz cut back then! Now I know it's time to cut all their hair off whenever they wake up with bed head. Hey, if I'm going to have all boys, there should be some perks, right? I consider being able to get them up, throw some clothes on them and walk out the door a major benefit of having sons! Saves lots of time on Sunday mornings!!

Grabbed the camera and took a photo of Andrew baking away in there; thank goodness for the bathroom mirror. I tried just holding the camera out to my side, but my arm didn't seem to be long enough anymore! We are so ready to welcome this baby into our family... these last few days seem to be dragging by so slowly. I think the boys are starting to doubt that he'll ever arrive.

Okay, so my James moment...

The boys were sitting around the breakfast table this morning, happily consuming donuts (I know, I'm a bad mom) that Simon had brought home from work yesterday, when the proverbial lightbulb went on above James's head...

him: Mom, I have an idea. Let's pretend this is a restaurant.

me: mmm-hmmm

him: You can be the cooker person...

me: the chef

him: yes, the chef, and the boys and daddy can sit at the dining room table

me: mmm-hmmm

him: then you can bring us a list and we can look at it (pretending like he's scanning a menu) and then tell you what we want, and you can cook it and bring it to us

me: uh-huh, well that's an idea all right

Chief chef, diaper changer, bottom wiper, maid, and comforter of all kinds of injuries... that's me! But, all in all, it's a pretty good job and I wouldn't trade it for the world (most days!) Check back with me in a couple of months when I won't even be able to remember the last time I slept through the night!

Crazy Hair Night

Last week was crazy hair night at the Awana club that the boys go to. And of course there's a funny story that goes with it! Three weeks ago James came home that Sunday night and told me that the next week was "crazy hair night" at the club. Indeed, I had seen on the schedule for the year that this date was coming up, and so when the next Sunday rolled around, we got James and John up from their naps and trundled them into the bathroom where we applied various gels and hairsprays in an attempt to get their hair to stand straight out from their heads. Their hair was pretty long at this point because I had not cut it on purpose, just for this night, and the effect was pretty impressive I must say. Then we loaded them up into the car and headed off to church. As we pulled into the parking lot, I started looking around (to size up the competition for the craziest hair award) and what should meet my eyes? Normal hair everywhere I looked! That's right... not a single crazy head in sight, except for my two goobers in the back seat. Apparently James was off by one week; NEXT week was crazy hair night. Well, there was nothing to do but swallow my pride and send them in, looking like complete goofballs. We were all practiced up for next week though... and here was the result:


And you know I had to scrap it!!

(image is linked)

So there ya go! Crazy Hair Night, take 2!!

The Craft Stuff

Some recent pages and projects that I've been up to...

Two more months and two projects for The Hybrid Chick blog, and I'm already working on my next post for November (me? work ahead? hard to believe, isn't it! Usually I'm writing the post and editing the photos late into the night before the day it's due. This time I've sworn that I'll get it done early though!)

I've also been doing my hybrid projects for Shabby Pickle. The frame is sitting on my piano right now, a reminder when I start to worry that God is sovereign and knows exactly what I need. The little jewelry box came out so cute and I was trying to decide what to put in it and who to give it to, but unfortunately I left it sitting on the dining room table and one of the boys must have found it. It did not survive. Ah well... that's the beauty of hybrid. If there comes a time I need another box, I can just print one more out.

I have been scrapping as I get the chance, although I haven't been as good about taking photos lately so I'm starting to run a bit low on material. (Mental note to self: get out the camera tomorrow and use it!) Kate asked me if I would stay on her team after my guest spot was up and of course I had to say yes. I've been having so much fun scrapping and crafting with her goodies. Here is Simon, my math & physics nerd; a birthday card for my big five year old; and a page about my Grandma. The last two are also from the trip we made in May to see my family in New England. The photos might seem like just a little moment, but each of the pictures I have of my grandparents and my boys together is special to me. I want to be able to capture these memories for them so they can look back and see how much they are loved by their great-grandparents.

Some pages with Creashens goodies... my sweet, sleeping Pete; a redo of a page that I'd done three months after I discovered digital scrapping back in 2008 (here's the original); and me with my new fall haircut. It's wonderful having a hairdresser in the family!!

And, of course I'm still scrapping with Nicole's wonderful designs. The first page is some photos of John and me the day we left for India; then my sweet little niece, and finally a page with a mix of (mostly) goodies from the Digichick for the last speed scrap there.

Whew!! Are you totally crafted out?? I am! At least for tonight. I'm sure I'll find some more creative juice tomorrow to work on another project. I have been doing some stamping so I'll have to come back and show you what I've been making. For now it's off to bed for me though, morning always seems to come early on Sundays!

(I'm too tired tonight to go through and link up each of the projects individually, so here's the link to my DST gallery where you can find them all if you're interested in seeing the credits, or you can check out my new Flikr gallery where you'll find the most recent projects. Okay, off to bed for reals this time!)

Nite!

Part Two!

More catchup

First off, my sweet niece as promised! She is so tiny and light; it's like holding a baby doll. We're planning to get together again this week; I can't wait to see her again.



This month I am getting a chance to guest for Kate Hadfield. She has such a fun, hand-doodled style and it is perfect for hybrid. I applied for her guest team in April and was so excited to get an email from her asking me to be her guest. I've been busily printing, cutting and gluing up a storm! Here's a card I made with some of her new doodles and a piece of cardboard I ripped off of one of the empty diaper boxes that I had. Of these, there always seems to be an endless supply; how I look forward to the day when I purchase the last pack of diapers!

And this one is for Simon for Father's Day from the boys. The razor is kind of an inside joke... everytime a new razor comes out, I always want to try it out and I'm always asking Simon if he wouldn't like to try a new one, but of course he's totally happy with the one he has! Now I ooh and aah over the new ones just to make him laugh. I'd seen the pattern for this somewhere on my blog travels, but I can't remember exactly where. After I'd creased and folded the cardstock, I measured out each piece that I would need and created a template in photoshop for them. I can't wait to see his face when the boys give it to him!


There's some more fun hybrid-ness coming up the end of this month over at the The Hybrid Chick... it's definitely baby season around The DigiChick with lots of the designers either expecting, or having just delivered their precious bundles of joy. The fun starts June 15, so be sure to stop by for some wonderful project ideas and even door prizes. I'm not quite sure what I'll be making yet, but I'm planning a trip to Michael's tomorrow to see what kind of fun things I can find to alter.



I added one more creative team last month; you can see my little FunkyPlayground Design blinkie over on the side there. They added lots of new designers at the beginning of the month so there's been all kinds of fun products to play with. Here's a couple of pages featuring James...


Another layout of James, this time with Creashen's Candid kit... that boy has the most expressive face! I'll never have to wonder what he's thinking. I know that he gets that from me though; I used to get in trouble without even having to say anything because my mom could see it all written on my face.


One last bit of fun stuff for today... during my blog hopping I stumbled across this blog called Paper Possibilities and loved her gorgeous cards so much, I really wanted to try her method of coloring and blending myself. I've always loved to color, and even now I'll sit and color with the boys (I have my own box of crayons!) So I decided to go on ebay and see if I could find some colored pencils... I put in a bid on a set of 120, but all the other sets were going for more than I had bid and I started thinking that I didn't really need THAT many colored pencils, so I decided to simply purchase a 72 piece set on buy-it-now and not rebid on the higher set. Unfortunately, no one outbid me on the first set, so I'm now the proud owner of 192 colored pencils. I have now sworn off ebay... way too dangerous for someone so indecisive as I am!! Anyway, as I was browsing through Paula's cards, admiring the eye candy, I came across some really fun stamp companies that I'd never heard of. One of them is called Elzybells, and it just so happens that their blog is celebrating it's first anniversary this month with giveaways and a discount on all orders so if you like to stamp, go check it out! I'm loving this set here (which will come as no surprise to anyone who knows me!)


Well, we're off to the wedding of my long-time friend's little brother so that's all for me today... I'll try to get some good photos!

Happy scrapping and crafting!

Part One :)

Overdue
What do I do?
What do I do?
This library book is 42
Years overdue.
I admit that it's mine
But I can't pay the fine--
Should I turn it in
Or hide it again?
What do I do?
What do I do?

Shel Silverstein

This little poem perfectly sums up how I feel about blogging right now... I want to, but it's been so long that it seems a bit overwhelming at the same time. I decided that the best way to catch up was to just post a little bit as I have time over the next couple of days.

Let's see... first happy thing is that I have a new little niece. I'm going to go see her again tomorrow, so I'll be sure to take some photos. She's so sweet and little and all of a sudden my boys seem a lot older and bigger!

I added a couple more CT's this month, and Shen invited me to stay after my guest term was up. I ended up winning the Hodge Podge challenge that I'd entered with her designs, and the kit is now available in both of her shop. I still can't believe how fortunate I am to get to scrap with her stuff! Here's a page I made this month with her Green collab and underneath are a few of her new kits that are just gorgeous!




The other fun thing I did was join the team at The Hybrid Chick blog. You can see the blinkie over on the side there. I feel a bit as if I jumped into water that is way over my head because there are some seriously talented girls on the team, but it's been so fun and the more hybrid I do, the more I am loving the flexibility of using the computer to plan out a project! It's also been fun to actually use some of my physical scrapbooking stash again. In fact, today was my first day to post to the blog and I created a fun little goodie can... click on the photo if you want to go check it out!


Well, the boys are up from their naps now so I'll have to share about my Ebay foibles later

Doing My Part to Help the Economy

Thanks to us, Sudafed and Kleenex should have their best quarter ever. We've been going through it like crazy around here. Lucky Peter is the only one not sick. I'm hoping that once we all get well again, we'll have developed some kind of immunity to it so that the next time it comes around we won't have to worry about it! Sick children are cranky children, so other than a quick trip to Costco for the essentials (milk, bread, and chocolate muffins ) we've stuck pretty close to home so far this week. After getting home from our shopping trip yesterday, I was carrying the last of the groceries in, and when I got into the kitchen, there was John, with the whole package of muffins (12 big ones) hanging from his mouth. He'd bit into one right through the plastic and was walking around with it dangling from his teeth. Before we left for Costco, I found him sitting in the fireplace. When he saw me, he crawled out and started running across the living room, ashes falling off the seat of his pants behind him. I think he woke up that morning and decided to see how far he could push his mom! Fortunately for both of us, today has been a MUCH better day!!

I haven't had as much time for scrapping the past couple of weeks, but I did finish my hybrid project for Valentine's Day; I made a little mint tin album for Simon with whatever photos of the two of us I could find on my hard drive. It was more work than I thought it was going to be, but fun to put together. The process of trying to find some picture of us made me realize that we don't have too many! Maybe I should hand the camera over to James and have him take some of us. Or maybe not. I'll have to think about that some more. Anyway, here's how the mint tin turned out:














I decided after I had already glued the album in to paint the outside. Next time, I'm definitely doing the painting first!

I'm still having fun guesting for Shen. I made a couple more pages; the first with her fun new set of photo masks, and the second one with Swell Set no. 2. I filled it up with photos from our trip to Seattle last December. It was just the push I needed to sort through the hundreds of photos we took and pick out some of my favorites.












Brittney's new kit this week was just perfect for this photo of my nephew. He's the funniest little kid; always going around with this look on his face like he knows something you don't know. My mom took this picture of him when she was at my sister's house one day; he'd just emptied his milk cup onto his highchair tray and was happily playing in the mess. If you buy the kit this week, you get a fun pack of glitter papers included in your download.












This last page is one of my favorites. The boys had so much fun at the children's museum; I can't wait until we have the opportunity to go back.


























I think one of the best things about this hobby is that it forces me to get out my camera and take pictures otherwise I don't have anything to scrap! Before I loaded everyone in the van for our trip yesterday, I grabbed my camera and took a few snaps of Peter in the front yard. He's just started walking and can take 6 or 7 steps before he loses his balance and falls. (Don't look at his hair; he desperately needs a hair cut!) He's tremendously proud of his new skill, and always looks around to see if anyone's watching him.
























(Frame & elements from the new Sugarplum Paperie collab kit coming to the DigiChick tomorrow.)
Well, I'd better go figure out what to make all these hungry boys for dinner before I find another bite out of the chocolate muffins with a bite out of it!