play, create, share

hello mojo!

The creative juices are flowing again! I decided to sit down and do some scrapbooking this afternoon and by dinnertime I had two layouts completed! Woo Hoo!

One thing I've decided to do is to stop "hoarding" my scrapbook supplies. I've always had a tendency to "save" certain supplies and not use them for a long time or save them for a special page. Well, over the years I've realized that it's just not worth it to save them. I've actually saved embellishments for so long that they either went out of style or my tastes changed and I didn't like them anymore. I know I'm not the only one guilty of this. Anyway, my new attitude is to just let go and have fun with my layouts. I'm not worried about saving the cute stuff instead I'm just using it whenever the mood strikes. I have to say it's made scrapbooking much more fun!

 

just what I needed...

So I'm back from the CHA show in Chicago. I really had an amazing time. I met some great people and saw so many terrific things. I also got to get out and see some parts of Chicago. I just love that city. Every time I go there part of me almost wishes we could move there. LOL! The whole trip just went great. At times it was exhasting but it was all worth it!We did have a little bump in the road last night getting home. We got to the airport to find out that our plane was broken and our flight would be delayed by almost two hours. So we get on our new plane and we're all ready to take off and then *that* plane was broken too! We sat in the plane at the gate for another two hours before we could take off. As frustrating as it was, all I could really do was just laugh. LOL!

The show was awesome as usual. There was just so much eye candy! I loved seeing all the fabulous new products that are going to be coming out over the coming months. There's so much to look forward to. I don't think I could just single out one product that I'm most excited about, but I do have several favorites. It's no secret that I love paper and can't get enough of it. Well, there was a ton of pretty paper to be had at the show this time. I can already tell that I'll need to do some serious purging of my paper stash very soon to make room for all the new papers coming out. LOL I think I'm most looking forward to the papers from October Afternoon, Pink Paislee, Crate Paper and 7gypsies. There were lots of other cool stuff we saw like Tim Holtz's new distress Stickles and metallic crackle paints. They're way too cool. I can't wait to be able to play with them. And Heidi Swapp came out with these really cool mirror albums that are just incredible too. They look like they would be really fun to work with. Anyway, I could literally go on and on for days about everything we saw. If you want to see some pictures from the show and read about some of the great products coming out you can go here and get the scoop.

One of my favorites parts of the show is seeing all the incredible project samples in all the booths. I'm always completely blown away by some of the pages and projects that are created by all the designers. I swear there were some booths, like Maya Road, where you could spend hours just taking them all in. I have to say that seeing all the amazing projects really sparked my creativity again. By the time the show was over I just couldn't wait to come home and start working on a project.

I have to say that this little trip was exactly what I needed. I have had just so much going on in the past few weeks, it was so nice to get away and not think about things. Like I mentioned briefly before I've had some health issues come up again and it's kind of brought me down. There's a lot of uncertainty at the moment about it all and I don't deal well with lots of uncertainty and being in limbo and all of that. So it was really nice to be able to have some time away and be completely distracted and not think about any of it. And then on top of it I came home feeling inspired, refreshed and wanting to create again. It was just what I needed.

So with all that being said I'm definitely planning on doing something creative this week. I've still got emails, to-do lists, housework and other catching up to do but hopefully by the end of the week I'll have finished a layout or project that I can share :-)

time for an update...

Well, I guess it's probably about time for me to finally update my blog given the fact that I haven't posted since last month, LOL. I really meant to post sooner but I've just been so distracted lately that I just never seemed to get around to doing doing it. Actually for the past couple of weeks I really haven't been online at all. I sort of took a little "computer vacation". It was actually kind of nice but needless to say that I've got lots of catching up to do and an overstuffed email box to prove it. Hopefully I'll get all caught up this week before I leave for Chicago for CHA :-)

I think part of the reason I took a little computer break was due to all the headaches from our hard drive crash. Thanks to those of you who have sent me emails with good thoughts and advice during our computer issues. You're all so sweet :-) The good news is that we did a better job of backing things up than we originally though. We're only missing about three months worth of photos and some of which I had already printed and scrapbooked. There were some photos of some school events that I did lose and I'm pretty sad about. But instead of focusing on what we've lost I've really been focusing on all the photos that we didn't lose. I do have to say that this whole experience has really been a huge learning lesson for me. I'm very grateful that things didn't turn out too horribly bad and we didn't lose all that much but regardless I'm still going to be much more diligent about backing up my data from here on out.

Despite some little bumps in the road our summer has been pretty fun so far. We've gone down to San Diego a few times, saw the new American Girl movie (which is wonderful, btw), spent several afternoons at the pool and have had some other fun family outings. The girls performed at the OC Fair over the weekend. We were all kind of concerned about how it would go. Half the girls from Emily's team are out of town for several week so they had to re-do a lot of their routine at the last minute. And then the day before their performance Emily pulled a muscle in her leg at practice. She was in a lot of pain on performance day. I was so worried about her but she's such a little trooper and she was totally determined to dance no matter what. There were a few moves she couldn't completely do but overall she did awesome. And Ashley's team was also incredible. They did fantastic. It was one of their best performances all year. I think it helps when they're just performing for fun and not worried about competing. They're supposed to perform a few more times before the fair ends. Unfortunately the fair people scheduled them on a stage that is too small and is covered in astro-turf, both of which make it a little dangerous for them to dance on. So we're waiting to hear if they can get them rescheduled on another stage. I sure hope it all works out because all the girls had a great time :-)

Oh, and another fun little moment from our weekend was on Saturday when we were driving down the 405 freeway here in OC and Chris was admiring this car in the next lane. It was a beautiful brand new Rolls Royce. I don't know much about cars but Chris said that particular model was *very* expensive. So obviously at that point I was curious about who would be driving such a pricey vehicle. Well, it turned out it was David Beckham. :-) He was actually smiling and waving out the window to some of the other people in the other cars that were looking at him. I'm not one of those people that gets a big thrill out of seeing someone "famous" but I did think it was kind of cool to see him. I did think it was funny though when the girls got excited because they saw "Posh Spice's husband". LOL

So that was my weekend. Unfortunately it's been a while since I've really done anything creative. I've tried to scrapbook or knit a few times but the creative juices just aren't flowing. I've been pretty distracted lately with some health issues (yes, again!) and so the creative mojo just hasn't been there. Hopefully I'll get that back soon. Later this week I'm off to Chicago for CHA. I have a feeling that seeing all those fabulous sample projects in all those booths and seeing all the fun new products coming out will help me get those creative juices flowing again :-)

t.g.i.m.

It's funny how things go but most of the year it seems like the weekdays are the hectic days and the weekends are the slow, relaxing days. Somehow that just wasn't the case this weekend. LOL! These past few weeks have just been crazy busy, especially on the weekends. I've been actually looking forward to today because I know that even though it is a Monday that it would be a day to (finally) relax and not do too much of anything. I woke up this morning and was actually so glad that it was Monday. Other than a quick trip to pick up Em from summer school, today has been a totally kick-back relaxing day at home and I LOVE it :-)

The weekend was a fun one, but a busy one. There was work, birthday parties, errands to do, a couple of appointments and some other fun stuff with the girls. The biggest highlight of the weekend was on Friday when we spent the day at American Girl Place. We've been there several times before but I don't think the magic ever fades for the girls. From the moment we walk through the front doors, their little faces just light up and there's this little twinkle in their eyes. I love seeing their excitement. Our first order of business was for Ashley to pick out her doll that we were going to get her for her graduation gift. She had also received some money for graduation from some of our family that she used to buy some furniture and accessories for her new doll, Mia. And thanks to their wonderful personal shopper, Ashley was able to score the very last Mia's bed they had in stock. Apparently it's now on backorder until mid September. Thankfully it helped get her mind off of having to admit her favorite doll into the doll hospital while we were there. She'll be there for about three more weeks. Emily also surprised us all by wanting to use some of her money she had been saving since Christmas and she ended up buying a doll for herself too. Emily really hasn't been into AG dolls for about six months now. In fact, at first she wasn't even all that excited about going to AG place. It's funny how things change as soon as you walk through the doors. Not only was she so excited about being there but she couldn't wait to buy a doll herself. Not to mention that she has been playing non-stop with her new doll (along with all of her other dolls as well). Both of the girls have been on cloud 9 with their dolls ever since we got home Friday night.

Despite the fun we've still been up to our necks with computer drama. Late last week we talked to the repair shop and unfortunately the problems with our hard drive are "catastrophic" as they put it and are about as bad as you can get. They've had to send it out to a special repair shop to try to recover the data. It will be a few more days before we know if they'll be able to recover anything and what it will be. The good news is that they told us that in the last ten years they've only had TWO instances where they couldn't recover any data. So that's encouraging. The bad news is that it could cost us between $600-$2500 to recover it all. OUCH! Needless to say with the possibility of an outrageous repair bill in our near future we've had to rethink some of our upcoming plans :-(  In the meantime I've managed to recover just about everything we had in iTunes. I found a program online that helped me pull everything off of our iPods. We've got back a pretty good majority of what we had. I'm pretty happy where that is concerned. But my biggest concern is still my pictures. I'm going to sit down tonight and verify what all I have backed up onto CD's and DVD's. But I do know for sure that most of my pictures from the last 6-12 months weren't backed up elsewhere so I'm really counting on the repair shop to recover those for me. Needless to say I've learned some major lessons from all of this. We've already changed the way we back things up and I'm encouraging everyone to please take the time to back up everything you have that's important to you and make sure you back it up in more than one way just in case something happens.

I finally "forced" myself to scrapbook the other night. I say "forced" because ever since this whole computer thing started I just haven't been able to think about scrapbooking. I literally get a knot in my stomach when I just walk into my scrapbook room. I hate it but every time I think about scrapbooking I can't help but think about all those hundreds, if not thousands, of photos that might be lost forever. It makes me feel so sick. I've decided to do what I can to stay positive about the whole thing and try to focus on the photos that I *do* have and all the memories I want/need to document. So the other night I managed to get two layouts done. It really did feel like I had to force myself to actually scrapbook something but in the end I was really happy with the layouts and glad I did them. Hopefully they'll be more to come this week and hopefully I can share some photos of the layouts too. :-)

starting off with a bang...

Well, it's only a few days into Summer and it's already turning into an eventful one with its ups and downs...

Anyway, we survived last week. I'm now a proud mama of a 4th grader and a middle schooler (ack!). I survived Ashley's graduation ceremony without needing an entire box of tissues. It was tough but I held it together, even towards the end when their principal started to cry (this was her last school function before she retired last week). All in all it was a beautiful ceremony and Ashley has been on cloud 9 ever since. School just barely got out and she's already counting the days until middle school starts.

Wish I could say that same about my little Emily who started summer school this week. She's still struggling with reading a little bit so we thought she could use the reinforcement. She's not too thrilled about the whole idea but thankfully it's only three hours a day for about a month, leaving lots of time for play, going to the park, splashing in the pool, etc...

We kicked off our summer by heading down to San Diego on Saturday afternoon. On Sunday the four of us and my mom went to the San Diego County Fair (which will always be the Del Mar Fair to me). We had the BEST time ever. There were rides, animals, shopping, games, and lots of yummy treats. And thankfully Mother Nature graced us with a beautiful day which was a nice change from the 105 degree weather we had been having most of last week. Going to the fair has been a tradition for me since I was a kid and the girls look forward to it every year. We actually had almost planned not to go this year because the girls are performing five times at the OC Fair next month. But my mom convinced us to go and I'm really glad she did.

So now that leads me to today where I'm in the middle of every scrapbooker's worst nightmare....Last year we got a new external hard drive for our computer where I've been storing all of our digital pictures, all of our iTunes stuff, my online class downloads and some other random stuff. Well, last night the hard drive just stopped working. We have no idea why. Chris has tried a bunch of things with it using our computer and his computer and so far nothing. All of my pictures from 2004 until last week are on that thing as well as the tons of stuff we've got in our iTunes files. I can't even imagine what I'll do if we can't recover what's on it. I do have most of my photos backed up onto CDs, but the bad thing is that I haven't been very good about backing stuff up lately so if we don't recover what's on the hard drive I will have lost all of our photos from the last year including birthdays, holidays, school and dance activities, etc.... Thankfully I have printed some prints for my mom that I can copy,  but that's really only a small percentage of what I'll lose. And then there's all the iTunes stuff. We're all iPod addicts and we had a ton of stuff. Some of it's backed up and from what I've been reading online we should be able to pull off the files that are on our iPods now. So hopefully that will be get us most of what we had. But my biggest fear is with our photos and not getting them back. I've just had this sick feeling in my stomach since last night and I just can't help but constantly think about all the photos from the last year that could be lost forever. Today Chris took the hard drive to a local computer repair shop so I'm crossing my fingers that they'll have some good news for us tomorrow.

Anyway, I know you've probably heard it a million times before, I know I have, but I'll say it again...if you haven't backed up your digital photos please take the time to do it. While I had most of mine backed up, I didn't have them all. Whether or not you're a scrapbooker, photographs and the memories that go with them are so vitally important to all of us. Regardless of the outcome of my situation I know that from here on out I will be very diligent about backing up all of my pictures and important files. I also plan on printing out my photos on a much more regular basis instead of waiting until I'm ready to scrapbook them.  I really encourage everyone else to do the same. This whole thing has been a HUGE wake up call for me and I would hate for anyone else to have to go through this also.

Ok, so here I am just a few days into Summer and wondering what other "eventful" things are in store for us over the next few months. Let's just hope the worst is over :-)

my day off...

For the first time in what seems like forever I actually had an entire day to myself. It was just pure bliss!

Chris had taken the day off from work to go with Ashley's class on a field trip. I had the day off of work so he decided to pick the girls up from school and all of that, leaving me with the whole day free. I can't even remember the last time that happened. I went to their school to watch Ashley get an award this morning (so proud of her!) and I was back home by 8:30 with the whole day ahead of me! I took advantage of all the free time and did a little scrapbooking, watched a movie and just relaxed. It was great!

Here are two layouts that I finished. Sorry about the picture quality. I was too lazy to scan them and the batteries on my "good" camera were dead. I finally got a chance to use some pretty papers and goodies that I got from October Afternoon's new lines. I just love their stuff!

This day was just what I needed, especially right before school lets out for the summer. And the icing on the cake today was when the UPS man brought my new knitting bag this evening. I've been anxiously awaiting this bag. I actually have the same bag in purple that I bought a few years ago but when she came out with a new pink one there was just no way I could resist...

I just love that pretty shade of pink. It's even cuter in person!

And check out the inside, it's just as cute:

Well, I better run. There's still a few hours left in this day and I think I can still squeeze in a little more scrapbook time :-)

is it summer yet???

The girls still have a few more days of school left and I have been having such mixed feelings about it. On one hand things have just been so crazy busy with all the end of the year activities like open house, choir concerts, class parties and other events. And still this week we've got two field trips, even more class parties, award ceremonies and Ashley's graduation ceremony, not to mention their annual dance team party at the end of the week. Part of me will be glad when it's all over and things settle back down, but on the other hand this time of year always makes me sad too. Watching the girls finish up another year in school is just another reminder of how fast they're growing, so part of me doesn't want to see it end. This year is even harder because Ashley is going into middle school in the fall. I swear it seems like yesterday that I was walking her into her kindergarten classroom on the first day of school with her brand new little Barbie backpack and her cute little Hello Kitty shoes that she just *had* to have. Now I'm helping her pick out a graduation dress and taking her into the "womens" shoe section to buy shoes! Where does the time go???

So even though my schedule is so crazy it practically makes my head spin, I'm doing whatever I can to savor these next few days. I'm really looking forward to all the fun things planned. Ashley is just beyond excited about going into middle school. Her school has some really fun events planned for all the 5th graders this week so she's going to have a terrific time. We've also planned a fun day for the girls later on this week at American Girl Place as part of our graduation gift to her. She's really looking forward to it. The only bummer of it all is that this past week she's been having a hard time with her abdominal issues. She's been in a lot of pain and just hasn't been feeling all that great. We knew with her condition there would be times like this but she hasn't felt this bad in a while and so it's kind of bringing her down. We keep reminding her (and us) that things could be a lot worse and that it will pass soon. So we're staying very positive and hoping that she'll be good as new come Monday morning for her class field trip. Thankfully she was starting to feel a little better before bedtime tonight so that's a great sign :-)

And despite these crazy days lately I still have managed to do something creative. I've been knitting like crazy! In the past week I've knitted two scarves and I'm on my second dishcloth. I finally tried this dishcloth pattern that I've been wanting to try and it turned out so cute. They make such a dainty little addition to my kitchen although I'm still not quite ready to actually *use* them on a dish yet. LOL

it's official...I'm addicted!

So, on Friday night Chris and I were watching some movies and I was doing some knitting. I ended up finishing up the scarf I've been making for my Mom. I think it turned out pretty nice. I don't think this picture really does it justice. It's pretty soft and bulky so I'm not sure how soon she'll be using it but it's exactly what my Mom wanted so hopefully she likes it. Anyway, here's a pic of it:

 

 

Now this is where I can tell that I've clearly become addicted to knitting. As soon as I was done with my Mom's scarf I was immediately anxious to start another project. The sock workshop I've signed up for doesn't start for another two weeks and I'm just not quite ready to go back to that (boring) blanket that's been on my needles for a few months. So I needed to have something to work on in the meantime. So I start looking on Ravelry for some new patterns. I also started rummaging through my yarn stash, which is actually pretty small compared to most knitters. (note to self: must buy more yarn right away!) And of course I find the pattern I want to work on and the yarn to go with it but I don't have the right needles! Ugh! And of course, by this time it's already after 11pm and there are no stores open at that time that would have the needles I needed. Sure, at this point I could just forget about it and wait until the next day to go and get the right needles and then just start on my project then. But what fun would that be? Plus, I still had at least an hour or two worth of knitting time to go before bedtime. (See this exactly why if I ruled the world there would be craft stores open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week!)

So being the stubborn person that I am I was totally determined to knit *something*. I figured at last resort there's always a scarf since you can pretty much use any yarn for that. So I went through my stash and I found two yarns that on their own are actually kind of ugly but the colors matched so I figured if I knitted them up together it might actually look halfway decent, LOL. So there I am at midnight knitting up this scarf with these funky looking yarns. I had no clue what I'd actually do with this scarf once it was actually finished. Maybe one of the girls would like it? I could always give it away or donate it if nothing else. But at that point I really didn't care. I was knitting *something* and so that was good enough for me. LOL.

The next morning I showed the partially knitted scarf to the girls with the hope that one of them would like it so that I could justify finishing it up. Well, as it turned out they both liked it and they both wanted it. So as it turns out now I'll be knitting two of these scarves which I think is kind of funny since I only started this scarf to have something to do until I could get the needles for the *real* project I wanted to start this weekend.

So this evening I finished up scarf #1. I used large needles so it knitted up pretty quick. Emily won the coin toss so she got the first one. She's so excited too! And I have to admit that I think these two funky yarns actually look kind of cute together.

 

 

Oh, and I finally made it to the craft store today to pick up the needles I wanted and wouldn't you know...they're out of stock! Ugh! So I'll be making the rounds now to other stores in the area this week trying to find them.

Well, I guess it's a good thing I'll be making *another* of these funky looking scarves to keep myself busy! :-)

just some journal pages...

So I'm really trying to make a conscious effort with this latest E-Zine that I signed up for. I've taken every zine that Teresa has offered so far but I've hardly done any of the projects. I've got them all saved for future projects but I really, really want to keep up with this one. Well, so far so good. We have had two prompts so far and I've already done both. Not only did I do them both but I actually completed them on the same day they were given. Thats's a huge step for me!

So here are my journal pages for our first prompt. I have to admit that I'm not totally happy with this page. I wasn't totally into the whole tracing the hand thing. It's very different from the things I normally do. But I decided to go with it since it's always good to step out of the box and try something new. It was still a fun page to make though, and for me when it comes to creating anything having fun is always the main point.

I really enjoyed the second prompt that we got yesterday. I just love the vintage photo download that was given to us. I can totally see myself using it again in other projects. I also did some paper collage and played with some paint which is always something I enjoy doing. I really like how this one turned out.

So now that I'm off to a good start with my journal I can't wait to see what Teresa has in store for us tomorrow :-)

ready to make stuff...

And so another week begins...

Although last week ended on a fun little happy note with getting my new (and so adorable!) purse, these past few weeks have still had some ups and downs. I won't bore anyone with all the details but my Dad's health has been starting to decline recently and he absolutely refuses to seek any medical care of any kind which has been extremely upsetting and frustrating for my Mom and I. I really wish I could just grab him and force him to go to the doctor's or the hospital but without going into all the details, it's just not that simple. So in the meantime I've just been doing what I can and praying A LOT and hoping that somehow things will turn around for him health wise and also that he'll stop being so stubborn about getting treatment.

So in trying to stay positive and keep myself busy, I've been doing quite a bit of creating lately  (gotta love crafty therapy!).

I've been doing a lot of knitting lately. I love how calming and soothing it can be. The scarf I started for my Mom last week is a little over 3/4 complete. I love how it's turning out. It's so soft and nice and thick too. I will share some pictures once it's all done. I think she'll really appreciate it when the weather starts to cool down. And considering how strange our weather has been in recent weeks, that could come sooner than we think! LOL! So I'm hoping to finish up her scarf here in the next few days so I can surprise her with it this weekend when I see her. I've also book-marked several projects I found on Ravelry that I want to start next and I'm also practically counting the days until the sock workshop begins at our local yarn store. I forsee lots of knitting for me this summer! :-)

I'm also really excited about Teresa McFayden's new E-Zine which kicked off today. I have just loved all of her E-Zine's that she's done so far but I think I've been most excited about this one and its fun art journal concept. I found the perfect book to use for it this past weekend at Oasis. It's from the new Making Memories travel line. As soon as I saw it I just knew I had to get it since it was just what I was looking for. I especially love that I'll be able to add some pages to it and I'm also thinking about swapping out the screws that hold it together with something a little more fun and funky. I spent some time last night embellishing the cover and "making it mine". I used some fun flowers and buttons from Making Memories, some tags and charms from Tim Holtz and a fun cool stamp that I had picked up a couple of months back. I really like how it turned out and I can't wait to start filling up all those pages.

And I haven't neglected my scrapbooking either. I've got a few layouts on my desk that just need some finishing touches. Hopefully I'll get those done this week too. It's hard sometimes when there are so many things you want to do and not enough hours in the day to do them all. LOL!