Thursday, August 28, 2008

Open House

Today we met Johanna's teacher and saw her classroom for the first time. She has a desk filled with goodies, which made her SO happy. Her best friend is sitting directly catty-corner behind her (see pic below). I tried to warn the teacher. She said, "We'll see how everything works out." Okay... don't say I didn't warn you. :)



School was packed with parents, children, and staff. It was great. I wish my mom was here to experience this with me. It's so strange taking my daughter to the same school I went to 35+ years ago. How wierd is that?! I'm so happy to walk through these familiar halls after all these years and know that my baby is in good hands.

And So It Begins

Today is the day I meet Miss J's teacher. It's a little strange because she's had the same teacher for the last two years. This is also the first year that Miss J will be at a desk and not a table with three other kids. Oh, she's excited about that one!

We measured Miss J the other day and she had grown 3/4"... since May! She is definitely going to be taller than her sister. Speaking of Miss C, she is now going steady with her boyfriend, Konnor. He's a really nice boy. From what I hear, he is also the finest boy in the school district. LOL He really is cute. He's very sweet to her, too. I like this one. Dad, not so much. He really struggles with Caitlin trying to gain some independence, especially when there is a boy involved. There are many days they try to trap me in the middle of their latest war and I have to stay as far out of it as I can. God knows, I have my own battles with the teen queen to deal with. Thankfully, we have the kind of relationship I always dreamt about having with my daughter. After boyfriend leaves, she and I sit and talk. It's amazing how much she confides in me. I'm so proud of her. Here is one of my favorite recent pictures.



That's it for now. Have a great day!

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Reflections of a Great Summer

T-minus six days until back-to-school. I was reflecting, yesterday, on what a nice summer it's been and I decided to put together an acrylic mini book with some of the fun things we did in it. It's very small and only has eight pages so it can't fit much, but I thought I'd capture a few of the fun things we did. Below is a short list...
  1. Golfing - golfing, and more golfing
  2. Out-of-town birthday party / sleep-over
  3. Fishing
  4. The zoo - twice
  5. Uncle Rick's - twice; once for Memorial Day and once for the reunion
  6. KI (Kings Island amusement park)
  7. Sharon Woods and paddle boat riding
  8. Weekend scrapping retreat to Indiana
  9. Visit to the stables
  10. Movies - and lots of `em!
  11. Scrapbooking with the girls
  12. Dating - lots of that, too (much to Tim's dismay)
  13. The Aquarium
It's been a busy couple of months and I've loved every minute of it. Below are a few pictures from my book.






Fall is arriving early and quickly this year. Driving in to the club yesterday, I noticed that all the trees on the main drive were turning brown and yellow. It's been so dry, we're not expecting much in the way of fall colors. Bummer.

Good-bye, summer!

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Role Reversal

Yesterday we had a little role reversal going on around here. Caitlin stayed home and scrapped her photos in the mini book and Johanna went golfing with Tim. Has the earth shifted on its' axis? Miss C filled all but two pages in her book with, literally, 85 pictures! She took a really good approach to it, too, but dividing the pictures by groupings such as place or event (as much as possible). It's adorable! Now she has something that she can share with her friends at school and friends from other schools. It was fun for me, too, to see her life and friends through her eyes and the camera lense (on her phone). I'd post some pics here, but I want to respect the privacy of the other teens and I don't have their parents' permission.

On to Miss J. Tim says we have another aspiring golfer in the family. The difference between Johanna and Caitlin is her passion. She brings it to everything she does. They're not keeping score yet; just working on the basics. It's funny, though... Caitlin looks like she was born on the 4th green of a country club (tic). Johanna, on the other hand, is our "wild child." She's got "bed head" at 4:00 in the afternoon, her face is almost always dirty and her clothes just never seem to fit right. That's okay. She'll figure it out. As long as she's happy and doing what she loves, I couldn't be happier. Here's a pic from yesterday. I rest my case. ;)


That's about it for now. I think I'm going to head out to McDonalds for an iced coffee, a weakness of mine. Have a great day!

Monday, August 25, 2008

Getting My [Blogging] Act Together

I've got to get my act together with this blogging thing. Everything else seems to take precedence, but I really enjoy this and need to be better about making the time. What I especially like is when I can turn some of my posts into journaling for a layout. Doing a copy & paste when I sit down to do a page makes it go so much faster.

Friday, Miss J and I went to Archivers. She did a page that was so cute! I'll have to scan and post some of her work, too. I'm so glad she enjoys scrapping! We were at the store for 3-1/2 hours and the time just flew. I was making a mini book and she wanted to make one with me. These books are tricky. There's lots of measuring involved and it's really difficult to get everything straight. I told her it was probably too difficult for her to do just yet but she wanted to anyway. Well, there's nothing she likes more than to prove me wrong. lol She did a GREAT job and put together a beautiful book! I showed her where to measure her pieces to and she did all of the measuring herself! The bonus is, that will put her ahead of the game in school, too. I was so proud of her.

The book I was working on is for Caitlin. She takes a TON of pictures on her phone. I figured I would make her a book so they could all be in one place. Then, when she's tired of the book, I can "sneak" it away andput it up for her. Below is a picture of the cover, so far.

While I was scrapping on Saturday, Tim took Johanna to get a new pair of golfing shoes... her first. She was SO excited! When she got home she got Tim's phone, sat down on the couch with her feet up and took a picture of her new shoes and sent it to my phone. LOL That kid cracks me up!

Caitlin's golf season is in full swing (pardon the pun). She's averaging three matches and a practice a week. Funny thing is, she'll finish a match and then go leisure golfing with one of the other girls for fun afterward. Miss C went on a date to a football game Saturday night. It was the city's biggest high school rival teams and they played in the stadium at the University. It was terrifying letting my little girl go there. I don't know why. I went there at her age. Just a dose of reality, I guess, that she's really not my little girl anymore. Who am I kidding anyway? She'll be 17 next month. Here is the picture she had taken last week for golf.

School starts again a week from tomorrow. I don't want the summer to end. I've had such a great time with the girls. Sadly, next week it's back to the grind of homework and all the other things that back-to-school entails. Funny, the girls are looking forward to it and I'm not. LOL

Saturday, August 9, 2008

Silly Kid Stuff

I am an only daughter. I have four brothers, but I am the only girl in my family. Being an only daughter/sister isn't quite how they make it out to be on T.V. Brothers don't necessarily care who the heck you're going out with. Who picks on you is your problem, not theirs. Actually, more often than not, it's one (or more) of them doing the picking. I spent a lot of winter days, a lot of rainy days, and... well... just a lot of days figuring out ways to entertain myself. Thinking about that now, I'm sure it has something to do with why I don't need to be entertained or constantly on the move.

One of the ways I used to entertain myself was to take mom's old Better Homes & Gardens (and other) magazines and pour through them, looking at the pictures from the articles and/or ads, dreaming of some day when I would have that sunken tub (unheard of then) and the kitchen as big as the entire first floor of our house -- always so clean one couldn't enter without donning sunglasses. lol I would cut or tear those pictures out of magazines, often for hours on end, and tape or glue them onto notebook paper in this folder I kept. I would then organize the pages by which house they were in. Silly, huh? I'm not sure, now, if I divided them by the summer home, winter home, etc., by location, -- or if they were divided by first (starter) home, second home, etc. After all, I would be so rich I could change a room or a house whenever I wanted, right? ;) Gosh, I wish I still had that notebook.

The other day, I was dropping my oldest off at a golf match at a local country club community. On the main drive, this house caught my eye immediately. I fell totally and permanently in love with this house. Seeing this house and the way it made me feel, instandly made me think of "the notebook." This is my dream house. It occurs to me now that I always collected pictures of the rooms inside a house, but I have never felt passionate about the house, itself, before.

Not to be all "stalkerish" or anything, but I am going to scrap this house so I can capture this childhood memory and maybe, just maybe, pull the page out every now and then -- just like I did with my notebook when I was a child -- and dream. A girl can dream, can't she? Thankfully, there's no price tag on that. :)

Thursday, August 7, 2008

Where did the time go??

I checked in here today an absolutely could not believe I haven't blogged since Monday. How did that happen?? Wow.

Well, I guess I need to catch up. Caitlin had her golf try-outs this week. She did make captain of the team. Yay! She secured the spot by over 20 strokes. Really cool.

Johanna and I went on a little field trip yesterday. We went to the stables to visit the horses. We haven't been there in awhile, so it was a lot of fun. I really went to talk to Bonnie about getting her back in lessons, but Bonnie wasn't there. So, Miss J. and I will go back again in a week or two to try again to catch her. What was really cool, though, was that some of the horses were getting new shoes while we were there. What a fun thing to watch!


The guys shoeing the horses were so nice! One of them even cleaned up a horseshoe and gave it to Johanna. Now she's walking around carrying the thing over her head for good luck. LOL!


What's kept me away from blogging this week is my 9-11 book. It is going to be amazing but, my gosh, it is SO difficult. I am in the journaling phase right now. All of the pictures are printed, trimmed, and layed out. About half of the journaling is done. When I finally sit down (at the retreat) to construct, it shouldn't take me more than 3 - 4 hours to finish it. In all, though, I will have invested about 40 hours in my book and the base of Lori's book.

Speaking of the retreat, I am so excited I'm about to BUST! This is my first getaway with my BFF and other scrapping friends. The place we're going is not a place that is specifically for scrappers, so we really have to plan well to be sure we have everything we need. It is a Bed & Breakfast (about an hour away) that will hold a maximum of 10 people. If, though, you book at least seven, you get the whole place to yourselves. We have nine people going, so it's all ours! We'll squeeze in a little shopping on Saturday. Other than that, it's scrap, scrap, and more scrap. :)

Since we are but a month away from the seventh anniversary of 9-11, I thought I'd leave you with a couple of pictures I found that I had never seen before. They have touched my heart and been imbedded in my mind forever. Please, don't ever forget where we've been or to focus on where we need to go. They say "time heals all wounds." Maybe so, but that can be a blessing and a curse. Remember.


Monday, August 4, 2008

A Wonderful Day

Today was just too much fun and went way too fast. We had a little birthday party for my best friend and a lot of scrappy togetherness all day. We then went to dinner at our favorite Chinese restaurant. We had cake, a singing balloon, several presents, and -well- just us. Couldn't have been any better.

Lori and I did work on the 911 project today. It's been seven years and, by trying really hard, I only cried twice. I guess I should mention that I gave myself a headache trying not to cry most of the time we were working on it. We decided to go with the mini book. Instead of red, white, & blue we are going with dark red, off-white, & black (mostly Rusty Pickle and some Cosmo Cricket). We've planned what we want to use and where we want to use it. Now comes the really tough part. There are quite a few photos that need to be edited (to fit the book) and journaling that needs to be written. I know I will be happy... and proud... when this is completed, but it's just.so.hard. I also, just this second, had the oaverwhelming thought that I should really do a second book so that each daughter can have her own. Wow.

The good news is, we got our books made today. They turned out really nice with "built-in" flaps and everything. :) Next photo/journaling prep and in less than two weeks - assembly. The good news is, I think I'm pretty close to something we can use as our title banner on the front of the book.
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Caitlin completed her first day of Varsity Golf try-outs today. She secured first place (for the first day) by eight strokes! She was really, really happy. Tomorrow is the driving range for a couple of hours - really a pretty easy day. Good timing, too, because it's suppose to rain and be super HOT.
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I guess that's about it for today. Nothing earth-shattering, but a great day all the same. Thanks for visiting! See you tomorrow.

Sunday, August 3, 2008

A Quiet Sunday

Today was a relaxing day. It was too hot to do much, so we hung out around the house mostly. Miss J. did get her back-to-school supplies. She was SO excited! She couldn't wait to get her name on everything and put it all in her backpack. She must have then emptied and refilled it five times. :) She certainly does keep us young at heart. Oh, and after most of the back-to-school excitement wore down, we snuggled up to watch a movie. You can ask for better than that.

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I'm also working on getting some major page kits together for our retreat in.less.than.two.weeks! Lori and I are finally going to tackle 911. No, I'm ashamed to say, I have not yet scrapped a single word or picture on the subject. She and I are both "blocked" on how to approach it. We decided to tackle this one together. We're hoping it will make it easier if we share pictures and general information, design a format together (to which there may be some variations), and share our thoughts and feelings as we struggle through the emotional journaling (most of which will be hidden). I think I kept waiting for the "silver bullet" before I could scrap the events of that day (and ensuing weeks/months). Unfortunately, seven years have passed and there is no silver bullet in sight. So, we have decided to dig our heels in and just do it.

Tomorrow is our planning day. We are going to lay the whole thing out and make decisions. I think she's interested in doing 4 - 12x12 pages. I'd like to do a mini book (from scratch - including the book, itself). I guess it's possible we'll be doing something very different on the same subject. The important part is the approach and shared materials, I think. We'll see soon enough.

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On a lighter note, about a year ago, someone gave me a pastry scraper to remove adhered photos, papers, embellies, etc. Used with Un-du, there is nothing that won't come up with ease. The edge is VERY sharp and fine - it will get underneath anything. I was getting a little concerned because I've used mine so much it was getting just a little bit dull and chipped on the edges. (It really does get a work-out.) I was on a mission to find another one. I found the BEST resource for these things. At https://www.kitchenworksinc.com/3522/Pastry-Scrapers , you can buy these things for $0.59/ea. Yep, .59 cents will get you these wonderful little gadgets. They even say in their product description that they use them to remove price tags. LOL I bought six to start. The order was here in three business days, priority mail. The customer service was excellent. I wrote them to tell them as much and received an immediate response from Louise, who was wonderful. Just something to consider a non-traditional scrapping tool that works great!

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I wanted to leave you with at least one picture today, so I decided to share my thoughts on an upcoming layout. As soon as I can round-up all the photos I have taken of birthday cakes I have made over the years, I'm going to do a couple (few?) pages about them. I think some of them are pretty creative, actually. I think I can probably count on one hand the number of store-bought cakes that have come into this house. This cake was made with a bunch of mini cake pans. Of course, Johanna's nickname is "bug" so we try to incorporate the theme when we can. This is one of my favorites and I'm really tempted to make it again. It's great for parties, because each child can have their own. This was Miss J's third birthday.

Thanks for stopping by! I'll be back to chat some more on Monday night.

Saturday, August 2, 2008

Catching Up

So much to do; so little time. When I'm short on time, it seems blogging is about the first thing to go. It's all good, though. The kids sure keep me running, especially Miss C. She won her last two tournaments. She won every single match in her Match-Play last week. The week before that, she won the Jr. Girls Championship and got the COOLEST trophy. Next week she has tryouts for Varsity golf. We know she's on the team, but she needs to golf for "placement" on the team. What spot you're in effects a lot during the regular season. Poor kids are going to have to golf four days in a row in over 90 degree heat with no rain in sight. There are no seniors this year, so Miss C will likely be the team captain. That's pretty cool and will be great for her golf resume. Here is Caitlin's trophy. Kinda looks like her, doncha think?


Miss J and I are having a ball this summer. She's home with me two days a week and we find all kinds of "trouble" to get into. :)

Last week, I made a mini book for the local family who received an Extreme Home Makeover. The girls and I took the book over last Thursday. She seemed to really like it. The house is GORGEOUS. I did get to peek in the front door. What a nice person Ginger (the mom) is! We stood on the porch and chatted for close to 1/2 hour. We asked her to come scrap with us sometime. Hopefully she'll take us up on it. I'm including a few pictures of the book, below.




We had our family reunion a couple of weeks ago. It was fun. We did have a good time. The kids had a ball. Johanna had a bunch of cousins to play with and, as usual, Caitlin and her cousin Ryan hung together like two peas in a pod. Abby is Johanna's "partner in crime." Inseparable, those two. I'll include a layout and a photo from our day together.



See? Don't they look like they're about to be up to no good? LOL Actually, they entertain each other and are angels when they're together.
Thanks for visiting! More to come... I promise.