... funny things are everywhere

vroom vrooooom!

Today is the last day of August. Tomorrow, the long weekend starts. Where did the summer go?!

Speaking of time passing by quickly, look at that picture... I cannot believe it's been over three years since that picture was taken. James was two and Thomas was four... and wow, has it really been four years since we moved into this house?! Eeeeek!

So for those of you who keep track of these things, it's been two and a half years since I started working on an ABC theme album for Mike's mom. You know, the A is for adorable, B is for Baby kind of book. Well, this page marks the last page for that book. (Yah, I did it out of order. lol) Hurray, it's done! All but the final page, but I think I may let the boys do that one for Grandma's book. ;)

Today marks the last day of summer vacation for the boys. All three of them. September brings a new school year and the beginning of my crazy busy schedule, volunteering at the school and daycare. Ack!

*deep breath* It's all good.

Time keeps on ticking away...

Where does the time go? That's what I keep asking myself. And those around me keep telling me the same thing... it's a sign of getting older, that feeling that time keeps passing more and more quickly. *sigh*

So it's been two years since I started blogging. Happy blog-birthday to me! :)

In less than a week, the boys will be going back to school... very exciting! Well, not for Mike. He has to go back to work. I'm sure the past nine weeks have just FLOWN by for him! I'm sure it won't be long before we're all settled into the school routine. I LOVE September, if for no other reason than this... the return to a predictable daily routine makes Thomas happy, and if Thomas is happy, everyone in the house breathes a little more easily. So yes, I am excited about the whole back-to-school scene. Yay!

Hey, here's something... I scrapped that oh-so-serious photo of Thomas, taken on the day he was wishing school would start already.

It's a scraplift of Nic Howard's page that she created for the BasicGrey booth at the last CHA. For some reason, I'm on a real scraplift kick lately. I guess I've hit another creative rut, and I want to explore different styles and techniques. Not that I did her LO justice. Oh well... it was fun to look through her gallery and find something to lift. Thanks for the inspiration, Nic!

One last thing... on my coffee cup today, a quote from David Copperfield:

The most important thing in life is to stop saying “I wish” and start saying “I will.”
Consider nothing impossible, then treat possibilities as probabilities.

That's it, that's all. Thanks for reading, folks! :)

second last Friday of summer

Hard to believe summer's almost over. It seems the days are getting so much shorter... and cooler. Before long, I'll have to dig out the jeans again. *sigh* I wonder how much taller the boys have grown this summer. I wonder if any of the pants they wore in the spring will still fit. lol

Seriously though, we've already bought the shoes. Kiddie Kobbler was busy last weekend. Obviously, I wasn't the only mom who was thinking about back-to-school. Man, it's expensive buying four decent pairs of shoes... indoor shoes and outdoor shoes for two kids. Eeeek! Oh well, it's done. I always cringe when I look at the total on the Visa slip, but it's worth it in the end. I mean, I don't want them to be running around the playground in shoes that pinch or bind, and I certainly don't want to have to replace them when they start falling apart in October, right? (Yes, it's happened before, and Kiddie Kobbler is great about that... shoes that don't stand up to regular wear and tear get replaced... LOVE that!)

Anyway, all this talk about shoes makes me think I need to take a picture of said footwear. Such a crazy idea... only a scrapbooker would want a picture of shoes, right?! *rolls eyes*

Speaking of scrapping... here are some 12x12 pages I've done recently.

(You can click to see a larger image...)

Well, that's all there is for now. It's 7:00, and I need to get some breakfast on the table and sandwiches in their lunch bags. Happy Friday, y'all! :D

OMG! TracyAustin!

One of my favourite scrapbook artists and dearest friends has just been named a winner in a major competition. Tracy, who is on the DT at Lifetime Moments, has just been named a 2008 Memory Makers Master. How awesome is she?! This honour is so well-deserved... and I am sooooooo excited for her that I can hardly contain myself. :D

For those of you who don't know Tracy, I "met" her on a scrapping website when I first starting scrapbooking in 2004. That site has since closed, but we've managed to keep in touch through e-mail and on msn. I had the pleasure of meeting Tracy for the first time last fall, when she came up to Canada from San Diego... and then I saw her again in January when I was down visiting my sister. Tracy's one of the sweetest, most down to earth gals I know. Her style is eclectic, so different than my own, and she creates effortlessly, as if she was born to do this! Check out her gallery and see for yourself. ;)

Here's a page she made for me last fall, while she was here in Ottawa:

Congratulations, Tracy! I'm so proud of you, my friend. :D

done! yay!

I found some photos for a couple of multi-photo frames we've had forEVER, and I edited and printed them and put them in the frames... and now I can scrap without having Mike give me a hard time. YAY!

More importantly, as I was going through my old photos (there are SO many good ones!), I found a few that were begging to be scrapped. Not only were the pictures cute, but many had stories that were begging to be told on a scrapbook page. Amazingly inspiring. It's not often that the stars are aligned, and I'm in the mood to edit pictures AND dream up the journalling to go with them!

Hey, I stumbled upon a funny quote today, and I realized I could use it on the "U" page of my mother-in-law's ABC album. I knew just which photo to put on this page too...

Thanks to Chris for the KI paper and the fun letter sticker on this page. :)

Oh yah, in case you're wondering, that picture of Thomas and me was taken on his second birthday. Welcome to the Terrible Twos! lol

What else? My good friend, Nathalie, is back at work tomorrow. Poor girl. After a month away from the office, I'm sure it'll be tough tomorrow. The secret is LOTS of coffee. Seriously. And if the sun is shining outside, it helps to keep your blinds drawn so you're not wishing you were out enjoying the weather!

That's all from my part of the world. Hope things are well where you are. Thanks for dropping by to visit me. :)

end-of-summer blues

My poor kiddo has the end-of-summer blues. We went for a walk after dinner last night, and he told me, "I wish I could turn the calendar page, and it would be Septeber 4th. Then I could go back to school."

I guess it's been a busy summer here, with lots of day camps and a big road trip to Nova Scoia. If I were seven, I'd probably be tired too. And I have to admit, I crave routine almost as much as he does. But not enough to wish my summer away! ;)

I cheated...

I broke the ban. No photos edited. One scrapbook page done.

Totally inspired by a journalling prompt posted on one of those challenge blogs. ;)

banned from scrapping!

Mike has expressly forbidden me to scrap another page until I get some photos edited and sent off to Costco or Black's for printing. We have a million (well, maybe not that many...) empty photo frames in storage... and lots of bare walls that need some colour. So in the next little while, I'll get to travel down memory lane and find our favourite photos and play wtih them in Photoshop Elements. Yay!

In the meantime, here's a photo, taken when the boys were 1 and 3 years old. New Year's Eve at a friend's house. :)

ETA: Click on the photo below to see the hilarious animated GIF! ;)

more pages & other stuff

Here are a couple of pages I did yesterday. I've been scrapping a lot lately, mostly to avoid doing all the other stuff that needs to be done. lol

Other thoughts...

1. I can't believe August is almost half over. Man, this summer has just flown by!
2. It troubles me to see how much my boys fight with one another. I've talked to other moms of kids the same age, and I know it's normal. Or within the realms of normal. So I shouldn't worry... but I do. :S
3. I need to reorganize all our closets in the house. It's a HUGE job.
4. First I need to declutter. I need to be totally ruthless about it. Maybe I should read up on TLC's Clean Sweep website for inspiration. Or heck, maybe I just need to call in the pros. :P
5. It sucks to be chronically disorganized.
6. Work is getting busier and busier. I love it. :D
7. School will be starting soon. That means my volunteer roles at the school and daycare will soon start up again. Eeeek! Maybe I'm going to be too busy?!
8. I'm back on the exercise wagon... after taking a whole 3 weeks off, I seem to be back into it. I need to start running again, but that shouldn't be too hard. My friend is back from French laguage training, and she's been on my case to run at lunchtime. Hopefully I'll be able to run with her sometime this week.
9. Last week, Thomas did a week of art day camp, and he loved it, so we have the boys both signed up for art lessons, starting in September. Yay! I think it'll be perfect for them.
10. It's another sunny day, and we will be going to my father-in-law's house for dinner. Maybe it'll be a barbecue?! Mmmmmmm...

Well, I have to go. I'm off to the gym. Happy Sunday, y'all!

scrapbook supplies

My circle of scrapbooking friends and I seem to have the same problem... too many supplies and not enough willpower to stop buying! I missed a couple of HUGE sales while I was on holidays. Thank goodness. Because I just know I would have ended up with even more paper and do-dads, all of which would be super-cute and fun, but none of which I would have needed. As it was, I ended up placing an order from an online store that's clearing out stock, and I did end up with a modest amount of stuff I LOVE but didn't need.

Oh, by the way, did I mention that I don't actually have any space to store any of these new acquisitions?! Ugh! I think I need professional help. :S

So my friend, Chris, cleaned out her scrapbooking stash this past week. And lucky me, I got to go "shopping" in her pile of cast-offs. I found some GREAT letter stickers and other alphabets (my major addiction), and I've even managed to use some of them on my latest pages. Mostly though, I took stuff that I thought James and Thomas might like. And some stuff for the kids at the daycare centre too. One scrapper's junk is another scrapper's treasure, right? Thanks so much, Chris!

Stuff I made... I put my LOs in the LO a Week album, linked on my left sidebar. I'll share one here with you though... my favourite one of my latest batch. I like it so much because it came together very quickly... 25 minutes from start to finish, and I even used some of the alphadots Chris gave me. :)

Well, I'd best be going. After staying on top of laundry and dishes for the 10 days we were at my mom and dad's place, I've been a total slacker since coming home. I need to get going on some household things. Have a great weekend, and thanks for dropping by!