Friday, December 31, 2010

Sweet Maggie

Hello there! I know it's been a while since I've posted. It's been a little on the crazy side lately. I trust everyone had a most joyous Christmas. I feel bad I didn't change my banner to anything Christmasy or post any Christmas pages really. I really didn't scrap all month. Bad me. So I am SO behind and I need to get my tush in gear and scrap!! This month has seemed to fly. I'm already in the swing of my second trimester in my pregnancy, so things are progressing! :) Did I mention before on here that I'm expecting?? I don't remember! Yup, due in June!!!!
Here's a page of my niece and I in November when they came for Thanksgiving.


May you all have a very blessed New Year 2011!!!

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

2 layouts

Ahh, I'm so late at getting these out. Thanksgiving week I didn't do any layouts... too busy and too much going on. I hope you all had a fabulous Thanksgiving holiday!!

This page I seriously tried scrapping these photos on about six different layouts... I was NOT coming up with anything I liked... I find it challenging lately for me to scrap a lot of pictures. I have more from this day too. but I am still not settled on this page. I pretty much spent the entire day trying to scrap these!  I think I have scrappers block!! I hate that! When I feel like no matter how hard I try, nothing seems to look good.


 
This page I put together really fast. I saw a super cute page over at Creative Inspiration blog, and I really wanted to do something like it, but instead mine is pretty much totally different. I may have to try it with just one photo. And now it's SOOO late, I need to get to bed!!

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

3 pages

Here are 3 pages I did last week.

  [Credits]

 [Credits]

Friday, November 19, 2010

Sweet Talk by Makita Studio

Hello, today I am sharing a sneak peek of a kit by Makita Studio (Dahlia Co), her kit will be released this Tuesday 11/23. This kit is super cute. I loved that it has so many things I can use for keeping up with the things my boys have been saying or have said. And what's better is, she's having a giveaway!! You can go on over to her blog for the details to be entered and get a chance at winning this adorable kit! She'll be selecting 2 winners, and you can enter to win through the 22nd. So go enter yourself to win this cute kit and good luck!!!


Thursday, November 18, 2010

Little Dreamer Creative Team!!!

Hi there!!! I figured I'd better share my latest news... though a little late on announcing this, but last week I found out that I was selected to be on the Little Dreamer Designs Creative Team!!! I'm soo thrilled and feel blessed to be on it. But I don't think it's totally hit me yet that I'm a part of it!! I'm just starting out but it's been fun so far! I've done a page and am working on another, unfortunately I can't show what I've been doing yet.... but will show next week! :)
So hope you all are having a fabulous day!!! Blessings to you all!!!

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Snowscape snowflakes

Happy Saturday and Happy Digital Scrapbooking day! Here is a page I created using Christina's Snowscape Snowflakes that just came available in the Little Dreamer Designs Shoppe
Hope you're all having a wonderful day!

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Another page

Man, we've had some crazy weather these past few days, right now it is POURING rain, seriously POURING! The temp has be unusually warm out and we've had rain, wind, thunder lightning and so forth!!! Crazy, but I love it!
So here's another page I created quite awhile back and never bothered to post.
Kits used:
Circle your date (tab used for the date)
Forest Explorer
Love hearts kit (Blue scallop)
Beach Bliss (clouds)
Raindrops & Butterflies kit (raindrops)
Floss Stitches
Travel Along templates
 Travel along kit (orange paper)
Summertime Kit (Brown craft paper, background).

Late, but here they are...

I created these pages earlier in the month and I guess I just kept putting off posting them. Not really in the mood these days. I first created the two pages to somewhat go together. But then the second page seemed like it was lacking something. So I messed with it some and then couldn't decide on what I wanted to keep.
I love how this first page turn out!
Kits used for this page: Happy Fall & Forest Explorer

But this second one just bugged me...
Kits used for this page: Happy Fall & Forest Explorer

So I made some adjustments and came up with this. I know that this one doesn't really go with the first one now, because I shrunk down the image sizes and added the stitching. While I like this look better for this page, I didn't want to do it with the first page. So I'm stumped, and I know that if I leave it like this and have it next to the other page, it will look a little odd.
Kits used for this page: Happy Fall & Forest Explorer
Other products used: Stitched by Anna White No. 2

Monday, September 27, 2010

Samuel's birthday invite

This is the invitation I created for my son's 2nd birthday coming up. He looks so grown up to me now.... It's amazing what a hair cut can do! Can't believe my baby is already almost 2!!!

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Friendship is a beautiful thing

Hi there & happy Sunday to you! Today I had a little free time to do a page. I've actually tried scrapping these pictures about 5-6 times in so many different layouts... I've tried templates, in color and so forth. As much as I wanted to keep these pictures in color, it wasn't working for me. So sepia tone is the way to go! Ha! Seriously, once I changed them to that, the page pretty much just fell together. I wasn't limited to what colors I could use and I could just be free! That's how it felt! Like the colored photos were crippling me! Ha! And I really, really, liked the colored ones too! But none the less, here they are!

Again making use of the Forest Explorer kit. Hope you're having a fabulous Sunday!!

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Me and my brother page

Here is a page I did using Christina's new kit Forest Explorer. Not exactly the kind of pictures I planned on using for the kit, but I saw these and thought it'd be cute. The pictures were dark and not the greatest, so I used an action to give them that old seventies look.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Two pages

It's been fun being a part of Christina's creative team. These two pages feature her newest kit, Subtle Memories. It's a really pretty kit!
When scrapping, I love it when things go together smoothly and fast. Like an idea will pop in my head and then I can create it and it turns out great! Well, lately things haven't been going like that for me. It's been more of, scrapping, unscrapping, rescrapping, and then repeat. I do not like it when things go like that. Because even when I do come up with my final page, it still feels like it's missing something.

This page went together pretty smoothly. But there were several changes made.


This one, I think I tried 3 or 4 different ways, and then pretty much went back to my original and just tweaked it some. Ha!

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Parade & Fireworks

I created this page a while ago. I think I really was struggling with liking it because the quality of the pictures are so bad. So it's not my favorite page, but I figured I better leave it alone after messing with it so many times.
Yikes!! It's soooo late, I haven't stayed up this late in a while, I better get to bed!!

Monday, August 9, 2010

Indecisive= two pages

I figured after 5 + years I better get our wedding photos all scrapped. So I am on a quest to accomplish that feat. 
I first created the page below... Because I was struggling with whether I liked it or not, I got a second opinion. My husband's (which sometimes can be a mistake) and he didn't like it so well. And I wasn't sure I totally liked it.

So along came page #2. (shown below). I got this one created and then had the two side by side and asked him which one he liked better. He said "hmm, I don't know, maybe I like the original one better now, I really don't know". And, I wasn't completely certain either. I like them both in different ways. I even asked my 4 year old son which one was his favorite, he at first said he liked the first one. And then he said he liked them both. So I asked him again to make a final decision and he said the first!! Ha! I don't always ask opinions on my pages, cause if I really like it and am settled, then I leave it, but if I'm uncertain, I guess I like another's opinion!

I like how this one shows more of the pictures whereas the top page cuts some of the images off. I tweaked and messed with them on the first page to try and show as much of the photos I could. So I am still undecided. I like the simplicity of this last one, but then I like the "funess" (if that's even a word!) of the first one!!! AHHH!!! I spent way too much time on these I think. I hate when I get stuck in a rut when scrapbooking. I have worked off and on on these for a few days now and I think I just need to leave them both alone, and come back to them some time from now... and we'll see which one I actually end up printing!!! :) Maybe I'll change them altogether! That's the fun of digital, you can change anything!! But not always good for me because I have such a hard time making a decision at times!! And really the two pages aren't too different from each other. Ones just sideways and the other horizontal with a little more simplicity.
I guess because these pictures are of our wedding, I am really picky at how I want them to be. So that's part of my problem.

For both of these pages I used:
And for the top page I also used:

Friday, August 6, 2010

Family

Here I am with another layout! Using most everything from different kits from Greener Grass Designs and some fun stitching I got free today from Little Dreamer Designs.
I had a hard time with this page. I was afraid I was loosing my steam for creating already. But after a few "facelifts" later, I finally came up with this. I guess I like it, but I'm not totally sold on it. Sometimes I just have pages like that. Where something about it bothers me, but I'm just not sure what!? Anyway I like the fun bright colors and the lazy summer feel it has.

Monday, July 26, 2010

Batter Up!

Here's a layout I created of Isaac from last year when he learned how to hit a ball with a bat.
Sometimes, my pictures don't turn out good, or I have my camera set on the wrong setting when I want to snap something real quick to capture the moment. So sometimes, all I have to show for certain moments is a blurry or less than perfect picture. And if that's all I have, I will use it to scrap! I've learnt (the hard way), to cherish (not that I didn't) each and every single picture I do have to show for my children's life. After loosing thousands upon thousands of photos, each picture I do have of them, mean SO SO much to me.

Sunday, July 25, 2010

Beach Bliss kit

Hello everyone!
Here I am with a couple fun layouts I just created yesterday! From our recent trip up to Michigan we had a couple wonderful opportunities to head up to Lake Huron while there. So needless to say, I have lots of pictures to scrap! I had the thought that I would really like some new fun beach themed digital elements to compliment the beach pictures! So I asked my sister-in-law, Christina if she wouldn't mind coming up with something! And she got to work right away! And came up with this cool new kit called, Beach Bliss!
It's been lots of fun to play with! Thank-you, Christina!

I'm now on Christina's Creative Team. I am to create two layouts a month featuring her kits as they come out! Here are a couple pages I've done with the Beach Bliss kit.


Saturday, July 17, 2010

Samuel

Here is a page I created this evening. It was a lot of fun to create! Sometimes if I have an idea fresh in my mind I have to scrap it right away, otherwise I forget my thoughts on what I wanted to do and express in the layout.
I love this picture of Samuel. This is one of SEVERAL consecutive pictures I took of him on this lounging chair, I want to scrap the others... I'll have to figure what I'm going to do with those to have them go along with this page. Using the different words to describe his character was a lot of fun! I could have added more, but didn't want to overdo it. I really wanted to use the word "exuberant" instead of "energetic", but it didn't look as good as "energetic" looks in that place. So, unless I think of some other way to put it on there or maybe on another page, I'll just leave it as is for now.

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Water Sand Sunshine

Over at the Creative Inspiration blog they posted a challenge. It was suppose to be for Saturday, but I uploaded my image anyway today on Sunday. I've never done it before, so I guess that was ok. You're suppose to base your layout from this one (which is totally cute!), and put it in their Saturday Scraplift gallery.
So this is what I came up with!

Silly sisters

Hey ya'll! Here's another page I created! I know, I can't believe I've been on a role with creating! Well, maybe not on a role, but at least my creative juices are flowing! :)
And when that happens I have to take advantage of it, before it goes away! Otherwise, I just can't create anything I like.
These were just some goofy pictures of my sister, Jackie, sister-in-law, Carrie and I back in April. It's fun doing something random. I used more of Christina's digi sets. Lots of fun to work with! :)

Friday, July 2, 2010

Beautiful Friendship

GASP!!!! It's me!! And YES, I created a page!!!! First one in MONTHS!!! Wow, it feels good! I wanted to use some new stuff I recently got. So I thought these pictures of my friend, Bekah and I, would be fun to do. These pictures are from our recent trip to Michigan.
It had been so long since I created anything, it kind of felt foreign to me at first. But it didn't take long for me to get the swing of things again. I used some fun digi stuff from Christina's Greener Grass Designs kits.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Scrappers block and links...

Wow, yeah, it's true, I seriously think that's what I've had... It's been a LONG time since I've posted anything. So much as gone on in my life these days. I guess I sometimes I feel guilty if I spend too much time on the computer trying to scrap instead of taking my role as a mother. So I try and put off the things that are "me time" during the day so that I can spend the time with my children or take care of things around the house.... However, when I have gone to scrap or take time, nothing has looked right to me, I am just not satisfied with anything I've scrapped lately. So I have come to the conclusion that I have scrappers block, and I sure hope it doesn't last any longer, cause I don't like it!
I know I don't have any pages to share with you, but I do have some links to some videos I think you might enjoy (especially you moms out there! ;).
This first one is taken from the "Love Story" song by Taylor Swift. So if you haven't seen her music video, you'll want to watch that first to get the full effect of where this take on it is coming from. I think it's just great and so funny, and true!! Haha!

And this one is just, well, plain HILARIOUS!! Haha!!
Trust me, you'll have this tune in your head after watching this!! :)
So I hope those give you a little laugh for the day!

I do hope to get back in the swing of things after I can bite this scrappers block off!! I just need to push myself. I've been looking at different peoples blogs for inspiration and I've had some ideas, I just need to put them into action!
Hope to be back with a post of something creative SOON!!

Friday, March 12, 2010

You are my life

Hello there! How has your week gone? With the exception of celebrating my husband's birthday on Monday, my week was pretty uneventful... Mostly getting over the nasty thing that me and my oldest son had, and then my youngest son ended up getting it. So I've been having to clean up puke and diarrhea, my poor baby! I absolutely hate when my boys get sick. I am just praising God for healing them!
We did have GEORGEOUS weather this week, in the 60's & 70's! I loved it and the boys loved it!! They got to play outside quite a bit! I opened windows one day, and I even did some raking in our yard yesterday! (we have a lot of yard work ahead of us I've realized!). But I'm wondering if I got into some kind of poison oak or ivy or something, b/c I've been itching like crazy today! Hmmm.
So now it's rainy, chilly and nasty out... But that's signs of Spring, right??? I can't wait for thunderstorms!!

Plans for a garden have been dancing around in my head lately.... I need to do some research and figure out what all I need to do to have a successful garden, I don't want to have it all die on me!
This is a page I created last evening. When I was going through my digital supply stash for what I wanted to use on this page, I realized something.... I had purchased a kit quite a while back from Little Dreamer, and hadn't really used it yet. When I was looking through the folder I have with the digital papers in it, I realized that I didn't have all of the papers that it showed in the set, I then realized I hadn't downloaded the whole set since I purchased it! So all this time I only had part of it! I'm kind of a dork! I felt like an idiot! I was like "duhh, Jessica that's why I didn't have all the stuff that came with it". I know every time I went to that folder and wanted to use the stuff out of it, it seemed it was lacking, and maybe another reason why I was just not getting any good ideas for using what I had of it! So after that moment of stupidity, I downloaded the rest of the set and got to work on this page!! There is a lot of stitching on this page, and I like that!! I am just really into stitching lately! If you haven't noticed?! Ha!

Anyway... I FINALLY got my March/April issue of CK today (since when have they combined the months??? are they going to do that from now on so there isn't as many issues???) I don't think I'm that crazy about that idea. Anyway, so much has seem to change with that magazine, and I can't say I'm extremely impressed with all I've seen recently... Hoping maybe they'll improve down the road. I do still love to get the magazine though. I have always been excited to get it and look through it for inspiration.

Have a wonderful weekend!!

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Blissful Love + crazy life------Warning.... LONG POST!

It's been a while since I've posted anything. But I want to thank those of you that are still faithful to leave me comments and visit my blog, old and new visitors! Thank you!
A lot has been happening here. It's been a roller coaster of emotions. It has taken me a while to even bring myself to scrap or do much with my pictures. I've had something pretty devastating happen to me. I haven't even wanted to blog, or talk about it much. Let's just say that something precious, irreplaceable, priceless, all memories I had to show for mid 2007 through to mid 2009 are gone.
A while back my husband took the pictures off our computer and put them on an external hard drive. Because our computer was getting low on memory and was running really slow. He didn't back them up on dvd's or anything else like I had asked him to do. I went to use the external hard drive one day to get some pictures off for scrapping. And to my dismay, my 16 1/2 month old son picked it up, and threw it on the floor.
I picked it up and heard something rattle in it. I didn't think a whole lot about it at first, I guess I just thought it would be okay, or I was just too scared to find out for sure if it was going to work. But when my husband went to hook it up to the computer, it would not recognize it. It made a funny noise. He worked on it for awhile to try and get it to work. But nothing.
I was devastated.
I was in shock.
 I started thinking of all the pictures we had on there, and what ones we still had on our computer. I realized ALL pictures from when my son Samuel was born were on that, all of his baby pictures, his first Christmas, every month of his life leading up to July of 2009 was gone. Other special events and moments flashed through my mind. My son, Isaac's 2nd and 3rd birthday, gone.
I cried.
I got fearful.
I felt like I lost someone very dear to me.
And what was more worse, most of those pictures I hadn't hardly even begun to touch to scrapbook.
I had just recently decided to really get myself into scrapping and going back to those ones and get them scrapped.
Now I can't.
My husband called a guy the next day, a local guy that specializes in recovering hard drive data. He sounded slightly hopeful.
We had another little hard drive we knew had some pictures from 2007 on it, and that hard drive wasn't broken, it just needed a special adapter that we no longer had to hook up to our computer to retrieve what we had on it.
He came the next day and picked up both hard drives.
Thankfully he had a cord he loaned us to use on the little hard drive, so we can get the pictures that were on that. But with the other one, he said it was beyond his capability.
he said there is a 95% chance that if we send it into a data recovery place they can get our pictures off it for us. But it's very expensive. Hundreds to possibly thousands of dollars to get fixed.
One more thing he tried, was to try and and retrieve the deleted pictures off our hard drive on our actual computer. But since so much time had gone by since the pictures had been deleted off our computer, it wasn't likely to get a whole ton of them. Because the longer you use your computer after you've deleted stuff off it the more likelihood of them being overwritten. And of course it writes over the biggest files first. Which would be our pictures and any videos.
Most of what he retrieved were small pictures, too small to do anything with. But there was a handful that were from the lost ones that I was happy he retrieved.
But just a small handful, compared to the THOUSANDS, and THOUSANDS of pictures we had on that hard drive.
I am praying.
I am hoping.
I am asking God.
Thanking him.
Praising him.
For the recovery of these precious pictures.
I don't know when we'll be able to send the hard drive in and what we'll find out, but I'm just praying that it will be good news and that I will one day have those pictures in my possession again.
Through it I thought of what it would be like to have your house burn down, and you loose everything. I think I felt somewhat like that. I mean, one day they'll all be gone and burn up anyway. But while I'm still alive on this earth and my children and children's children, I want to have those pictures. To remember, to reflect. Because that's all I have to show for that part of our lives, is just pictures. And sometimes we don't remember things unless we have a picture that shows for that moment.
I created this page today. They are pictures from Valentine's day. I've had some new digital supplies sitting in my folders for a while now, but haven't touched them until today. Like I said it took me a while to bring myself to scrap. It's just been hard. But I've realized how I really need to work harder on my bad habits. Like procrastination. Because if I wasn't like that, and was on top of things all the time. Then I could have already had those lost pictures scrapped. But I am not like that, and I didn't have them scrapped. So there's nothing I can do about it now. Other than just try to be better at it now. To not keep putting it off.
So on top of all that going on. We've been through some other crazy things lately.
We were without heat in our house for over a week. (long story). Our oil tank leaked. We lost all of our oil for heating. We had just had it filled a week before it happened. Thankfully, we were able to get a used tank from someone for 50 bucks. But we were still out the oil we lost. AND top of ALL of that, my son, Isaac & I got sick earlier this week . Some kind of stomach virus thing. It was not fun. Praise the Lord we are much better today!
I just thank the Lord for his faithfulness and seeing us through these trying and stressful times. Knowing that he's always there for us and can help us through these times is a wonderful feeling.
So if you got through this super long wordy post, Thank you for taking the time to read it!

"The Lord is my rock and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower." Psalm 18:2

"The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? When the wicked, even mine enemies and my foes, came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled and fell. Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear: though war should rise against me, in this will I be confident." Psalm 27:1-3

"Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord."
Psalm 27:14

Have a wonderful rest of your week and weekend!

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Being me

Here's a layout that I did a while ago. I have hesitated to post it because I wasn't sure I really wanted to.
I have changed it many times, and I'm not sure if this is going to remain this way, so we'll see if I change it yet again. Ha! It's hard for me because I don't normally scrap pictures of just myself, especially when I don't like the way I look... but after all that's kind of the whole point of this page is, breaking through that apprehension of scrapping about myself, no matter how unhappy I am with how I look.

Friday, February 5, 2010

5 years ago today!

Today my husband and I celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary! I wanted to get this post out sooner or have it scheduled, but I didn't get a chance to. Anyway thought I would share some pictures from our wedding day! We've been so blessed over the years and God has seen us through so much! We are so thankful for all he has given us and done for us!













It's so funny to think that on our wedding day it was about 70 degrees and beautiful out! And today on the same day five years later it's crazy snowy white, icy/rainy and very nasty out! We've had so much snow this year!
Thanks for stopping by to share in our 5th anniversary! Blessings to you all! :)

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Attention Jane Austen fans!

For those of you who like Jane Austen, I thought I would share a link with you! They have redone Emma, and have made it into a longer version. It's aired on TV through PBS (I think) each Sunday evening. You can also watch the full length shows of it online through Masterpiece Theater (for those of us who don't watch tv or have cable or satellite). My sister and I have watched the first episode together, and it was 2 hours long!! You can now watch the second episode online now as well. I plan to soon. I just have to say that I really like this one! I have always liked Emma, and I am so happy they've made a longer version of it! I really like the characters in this one. Except, I have to admit, no one plays Mr. Knightley as good as Jeremy Northam. So although the Mr. Knightley in this new version isn't quite as good as the 1996 version, he still does a good job and I do like him quite well. I won't give too many details, but I would highly recommend you watch this!! I just love Jane Austen's stories and period films!! So pop yourself some popcorn, get cozy and enjoy!

Monday, February 1, 2010

blogiversary + Birthday


A year ago today I started my blog! I really don't have anything special to do in celebration of it. But I do have two pages I did from my birthday. As you may notice the first page is a redo of my original I did a week or so ago. I really didn't like my original one I designed, I just felt like it wasn't me. So it was bugging me too much, I just had to redo it! There are a few others I've done recently that I'm in the process of redesigning because I just don't like them. I feel like because I was kind of forcing myself to get them scrapped, that I wasn't designing what I truly like and what my style is. And lately, I'm not totally sure what my style is, but I have noticed I really am liking more simple designs, nothing too complicated and stressful on the eyes. I like things to look CLEAN and well balanced I guess. White background, a few flourishes, stitching (maybe you're getting sick of seeing me use so much stitching?? I'm just really into it right now!).
And I really like adding color- making my layouts bright and cheerful!
For this page I was inspired by this layout.

And because I'm not use to using a lot of pink on my pages (since I mostly do pages of the boys) I really wanted the page with me to look girly! I don't get that many opportunities for that and to use PINK! And I have so badly wanted to use it! And these papers from Crystal were just that! Bright and cheerful, and pink! They're really simple and clean looking, I guess that's what attracted me to them, oh, and the hearts and poka dots! I've been getting most of my inspiration from HERE & HERE lately. Crystal has been featuring digi kits that were designed by her little sister on her blog for a special price for one week (info here). I think that's so sweet that she's helped her sister out by doing that and also for helping her in design! I think that's awesome when people are so selfless and are so willing to give of themselves and teach others. Just a good example of how God wants us to freely give to others. I'm really trying to have a positive outlook on different circumstances in my life, and trying to always think the best of others. Sometimes it can be difficult, but with the Lord's help, he can see me through these changes! :)


So anyway, thanks for taking the time to stop by and visit me today! And to celebrate my one year blogiversary!! Maybe I'll eat a piece of chocolate cake in celebration of it! And you can go ahead and eat some too! :-)
Speaking of anniversaries, my husband and I will be married 5 years this coming Friday, the 5th! I'm really looking forward to it! It will be the first time in a LONG time that we'll get to go out alone together, just the two of us, no kids.
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Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Pure joy & side by side

Hello, well here is my other page I did with the rest of the pictures I had of Samuel from the layout I did of him before. So this is the second page. There were just too many stinkin cute pictures of him, I had to use most of them! so this was how I decided to do it.



And here are the two pages side-by-side.


I wonder if maybe I don't have an updated version of Picasa, b/c I can't for the life of me figure out how to post two pictures at the same time??? There were NO options ANYWHERE, it would only let me do one at a time. So I just used regular blogger for posting these.

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

26 years of life

Okay, honestly, I'm not sure if I like this page. I really am not too crazy about the last few pages I've done lately. But one thing I know is, that at least I'm scrapping them and getting them done! But I do want to like my pages and have a purpose for why I'm scrapping them. But I figure even if I get the things scrapped now and get them done with, I can always come back to them another time and redo them if I have a better idea for them.


This was from my birthday in December. I have more from that day, but I think I will scrap those on another page, or two. One thing I love about digital scrapping is it's soooo versatile and you can pretty much do whatever you what!! Redo it, and not have a torn up mess. You can change the colors of anything to have it match your layout, resizing anything you want whatever size you want, and if you have pictures from a certain day or event you can make multiple pages, (not that you can't do that with traditional), but it's just so much fun and easy! And who says you only have to have one page from that day?? Oh, the possibilities are endless!
P.S. this is my first time blogging from Picasa... Yeah, seriously, the FIRST. I've wanted to use Picasa so bad in the past but I could NEVER get it to work for me when I wanted to blog from it. So I just haven't tried in a really, really long time. So it's working now! Yay! But I don't notice as many options I normally have when going through regular blogger... Am I not noticing everything?
Dreamland is calling my name! Goodnight!
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Monday, January 25, 2010

Picnic

Here is a page I created last night of the boys and I, having our last picnic outside at our old house.

This page was a little challenging. It turned out differently than I first planned. Sometimes I find it difficult to use so many pictures on  a layout. So I mostly just wanted the pictures to be the focal point of this layout. I kept it pretty simple. I tried adding other things (elements and such), but it just didn't look right.
Designer Digitals has this new kit out that I think I fell in love with! I really like it! It's a collaborative kit that several different designers contributed to, and Ali Edwards and Katie Pertiet are two of them, along with many others, I really like their work! All the proceeds go to the victims of the Haiti earthquake. While it's a little more than what I normally spend on a kit, I just might have to get it! But I can't this week. So I will have to wait. I have my eye on some other digital goodness I've seen lately as well!

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Tupperware Mess + 2010 word

Hello!! Here I am with another page!! Yup! I am really trying to force myself to get into a scrapping routine so that I can get some of my scrapping underway here. I just have way too many pictures and I feel SO FAR behind. And I am tired of procrastinating. So instead of really having an order of what I'm scrapping right now, I just go through my pictures and find ones I would like to scrap and go from there.

So this is a page of my sweet little baby back in the summer, I can't believe how young and little he was here and how FAST time has gone! It almost makes me want to cry! So this page went together rather fast. I kind of had an idea in mind. And these frames I purchased from Designer Digitals a few weeks back are nice for doing a quick page. I'm not totally sure if I'm sold on this page, I don't know, maybe it has to grow on me.


So ever since December I had been pondering on what my word for 2010 was going to be. I prayed about it and thought about it a lot. And nothing would come to me. So many things came to mind that I wanted to work on and change in my life. Last year my word was "grow", and in many ways I felt I didn't achieve that goal as much as I had hoped. But when I sat down and thought about it, I think the Lord showed me that I did grow, but not necessarily in the areas I expected to, but in the areas that the Lord needed me to! So it's amazing the things he shows us and ways he humbles us.
And while there are a lot of things I still carry from last year, things I want to change and work on in my life, as I'm sure there will always be some. It's not like everything magically disappears over night right when the clock turns midnight and the new year begins! Of course to God it's just another new day to serve him and follow him. And really, we should treat everyday like a new year, a day to start fresh, to be forgiven (if need be) and learn to forgive yourself (again, if need be), (A friend really encouraged me in this! You know who you are! ;) and move on throughout the day. Allow God to be our strength and might throughout the day.

Too many a time I find myself these days really getting down on myself for failing in the areas I really want to change in. Areas that I don't like about myself. If I make it a point to not give into these things throughout the day, and then fail to do so, I really, REALLY beat myself up about it. I have a little battle in my mind with myself. And I know I don't want to keep doing this over and over again. And I know the enemy wants to bring me down and get me depressed. But it's my choice to be depressed and let him get me down. And that's something I DO NOT want to give into. I know I will always be growing and changing and moving forward. But sometimes it's really frustrating when you feel like you're going through the same things everyday and feel like you're never going to learn. Like HOW MANY TIMES IS IT GOING TO TAKE ME BEFORE I GET IT THROUGH MY HEAD!?!
But really, it all comes down to overcoming. God wants us to be over comers of our bad habits, areas that aren't necessarily sin, but that could eventually become sin if we continue to hold onto it. And only by the Holy Spirit and God's strength can we overcome these habits in our lives.
And lately, there are just a lot of things I believe the Lord has shown me that I need to work on and change about myself.
There's' so many things that I want to work on.
I'm just tired of being a slacker and procrastinator and not being organized and punctual or have any kind of normal functioning routine... waiting until the last minute to do things, putting things off and waiting for that "perfect" time (in my mind) to come, which if I do that I will never finish all the things I want to.
I'm tired of getting upset with my boys and giving into anger and frustration.
I'm tired of being lazy, not giving myself a routine to go by each day. Sitting around doing nothing because I feel overwhelmed.
Feeling like a bad wife and mother. God wants me to love myself and be happy with who I am (not in a haughty and prideful way). But because I am a child of him and his creation, it is his will that we love ourselves and we love others and love him.
I want to give all I can and be all I can for HIM, to grow stronger and deeper in HIM and his truth. To be all he wants me to be. No more or no less. And this will be a continual thing throughout my entire life as I walk with HIM.
So during this past week, my word came to me. It was really cool too! I had been studying the word "STRENGTH" throughout this past week. I would look up different verses on it and then write them down. It was very encouraging. A VERY great word to study. If you ever want to study that word I highly encourage you too, or any word for that matter. It's just so encouraging to have a word to look up in the bible, read all the many verses on that word and write them down, it really helps for it to sink in. There were so many verses that really spoke to me and stuck out to me.
And while it was actually when I was reading a little daily inspirational book I have by Joyce Meyer when my word came to me. And I hadn't read this book in a long time, but thought I would open it and read some. So I read one page, and what was the word that stuck out???

CHANGE.

Yup.

simply.

CHANGE.

And that pretty much covers it all! Ha!
God wants me to change the areas of my life that I have allowed to become bad habits and that could become something even worse if I don't do something about it. And I want to change because I am unhappy with my bad habits and things I have given into.
And I realize this is a pretty big feat for me. And in some ways it kind of scares me. Because I know that this will take A LOT of discipline. And probably a lot of trial and error.

This verse was my last verse I wrote down for the week. And it really just spoke to me. So I want to share what I got from it.
Colossians 1:10-12 "That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness;"

That I walk worthy of the Lord in ALL pleasing!
I sure don't feel like I do much.
To be fruitful in every good work and increasing in knowledge of God..
I sure want to be more like this!
strengthened with all might, according to God's GLORIOUS power, unto all patience and longsuffering with JOYFULNESS.
That's what I want to be, to be strengthened and to allow God's strength to strengthen me through his glorious power, and with patience I can get through these times and changes one at a time, instead of trying to change all at once..
While having the longsuffering of working through it all, and while going through it to have joyfulness and even more joyfulness coming out of it!

Whew!! Okay, so now I really wrote a book here. And I really don't know how many of you out there still visit me and my little blog, but for those of you few that do, THANK YOU! Thank you for taking the time to read all of this and what I have to say! I pray that God is showing you things and encouraging you in areas of your life that you would like to change or even make better! Because you CAN do ALL things through Christ which strengthens YOU!
I will end here.

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Living life

Hello there! Happy Saturday to you! I know I have been MIA a lot these days. So sorry about that!
I've just been trying to get my priorities right and be a good wife and mommy. However, I really have been wanting to scrap and I've felt like I've been in a rut for a really long time. I purchased some new stuff a few nights ago and really wanted to use it. I really haven't had a whole lot of chances to scrap, especially during the day, because I know if I do I will have my face stuck to the computer for TOO LONG and it will take away from my time with my boys and getting things done around the house. So I scrap at night, when I can get myself to stay up, but not always good, because I pay for it later! Anyway. I hope you all haven't forsaken me totally. I wanted to share this page I created last night of my son, Samuel.
He's always so full of life and energy and happiness! I just love this little man! I have more pictures I wanted to add to this and I wanted to add journaling. But I may just make another page that matches it so that I will have them side by side in an album, not necessarily a two-page spread attached but just two separate pages that go together or coordinate. I love all the bright cheerful colors in this layout! I think I am happy with how it turned out! I will decide later when I''m creating the other page if I want to change it any. So thanks for taking the time to visit me! And I hope you all forgive me for my absences... I know I had mentioned in some earlier posts that I wouldn't be posting quite as much, so hopefully you all understand!! Hope you have a terrific weekend!! God bless!

Here is a list of the elements I used for this page:
Bring on the Grunge Vol 2 - Lines
A Lovely Afternoon {Kit}
With Love
Stitched by Anna White No. 02
CurvyCorners Stitched Borders No. 01 12 X 12
Photo Clusters No. 16

Monday, January 4, 2010

Home remodeling- Part 3

I think my posts are out of order, but all well. Anyway..

We painted the boys room shortly after we moved in. Here are a few before pictures. They're really dark and bad looking, but none the less here they are..


The lighter blue "splotch" was the blue we first bought, but didn't like it. So we went with the darker color.






 This is the view of their room from their doorway standing in the hallway.


Once in, to the left is the dormer window which is painted with a really light pretty pastel blue.




Then to the right is the other end of the room with closet.





A few more views of the dormer window...





A view standing in the room looking to the wall with their door into the hallway. There will eventually be a regular size bed put where the crib is. We're thinking of a bunk bed with a full size bottom bed. We also need to change out the light switches, outlets and plates to white. We will be buying furniture and other things like a rug for their room in a few months.