Control

I ended up doing meal planning this week and will start my home blessing hour next week. What I have found makes all the difference is to take a monthly calendar and pencil in the main course for supper for each day. I have a meal plan that I use from Chart Jungle but check out this divine design from Biograffiti. Free to download!

I have the days of the week categorized to give it some predictability and to guide me:
Monday: Pasta (tortellini, spaghetti, perogies, lasagna)
Tuesday: Rice (every second Tues. I make stir fry. Then there's fish, meat marinades) 
Wednesday: Vegetarian (every second week), eggs 
Thursday: Slow cooker, stew, soups in the winter. Summer it's BBQ night. 
Friday: Pizza (every second week: frozen, ordered, or homemade) alternating with hot sandwiches (tuna turnovers, swiss & turkey)
Saturday: Leftovers, or eat out
Sunday: Meat focus (roast, baked chicken, ribs)

Pasta for Monday because it is quick and easy and that's what I need for starting out my week. This plan overcomes the "what should we have for supper in 5 minutes?" hurdle. The best tip that I have received is to take THREE items from the freezer at a time. So, let's say that you've been playing Bejeweled Blitz on Facebook all afternoon (congrats on your "new high score"!) so you're going to have to serve pasta because there isn't time to thaw anything, right? Sure, but go to the freezer and get out 3 items (chicken, pork and beef, let's say) and put them in your fridge and tomorrow, after spending the afternoon earning another "new high score" (have you no self-control!? haha), you check your fridge for whichever item has thawed the most. You make supper around that and your husband will be SO pleased to not have spaghetti again!

On Monday I baked a pumpkin and puréed it. We baked and iced some pumpkin cookies and I made my favorite pumpkin-pear soup. YUM! As my boys were groaning around the kitchen table, I was asked to say grace. Frustrated, I prayed "Please send down some big, strong angels to make my kids eat the delicious soup that I have prepared so that I don't have to kill them." Haha! It helped me to lighten up but God didn't answer my prayer (at least not how I had creatively suggested). I then told my 7-year old (again) that he should give up determining whether supper will be tasty just by looking at it, because eyeballs do not have taste buds.  I tried threatening that there would be no dessert but my 13-year old was okay to pass on the "cookies with squash in them". My DD happily ate her soup. Sigh.

Later, while thinking about the meal, the thought came to me that instead of making a salad with feta, which offended 1/3 of the taste buds in my house, I could serve a choose-your-toppings salad. The next night I served a bowl of fresh spinach with custard cups of feta, mandarins, and candied cashews. Everyone had salad. Brilliant! And that's where I recognized that as I gain more control over myself, I'm able to loosen the control that I've tried to have over my children (with or without the help of big, strong angels!).

$8 a day

Hello again! I was an artisan/shopper for the month of October, rather than November. I had so much fun! The first weekend I went with some wonderful friends and relatives to a scrapbooking retreat for 3 full days. Delightful!

[Photo courtesy of Deena - thanks, girl!]

My sister and I just took our laptops and I finished up pages for my oldest son, and started working on the 2 family calendars that I'm doing for Christmas gifts. The family calendars are now complete and if I ever figure out how to complete an order at lulu.com, they will be printed!! Here's a little sample.

 [Above is June from the calendar for my side of the family. Below is November for my DH's side. Does that picture bring you great happiness, or WHAT!?!]

 I also have two 75 page 12x12" photobooks enroute from Shutterfly. One each for the twins. I've embedded Kepler's photobook here (yes, SOOOOO tech savvy). 75% of the pages in his book also appear in his siblings' books.

Click here to view this photo book larger

I also custom ordered some t-shirts for DH and one of my boys, but I can't say too much just in case DH stops by here. But the CDN $ is almost on par with the AM $ so go ahead and order some gifts from the states!

Which leaves me the profession of a Monk for November. I had to LOOK UP what I had accomplished last time I was a Monk (all of five months ago!) and was surprised to see that I got up at 7:45! I have no recollection of that (repressed, I guess! haha). But I'll start November where I left off:

1. no screen time between 2 and 8pm
2. getting up at 7:45 everyday (gulp)
3. morning prayers daily

I'd better write that down on my mirror! So I'll pay myself $8 a day for meeting my daily goals toward my monthly reward of earning a smile for Operation Smile. So here's my plan:

1. Week 1: practice my achievement from when I was a monk in April
2. Week 2: add daily scripture reading
3. Week 3: add weekly home blessing hours (link to Flylady)
4. Week 4: add meal planning

Now click play on this video, close your eyes and treat yourself to 3 minutes of relaxation. Thanks for reading!

Organizing clutter

Well, I'm here to tell you that you can't organize clutter; you have to get rid of it. But what to do with it?!? I'm sure that you've heard that when you go through your clutter that you should label boxes "keep", "trash" and "donate". I have a Good Will donation center right near my house which is brilliantly convenient. Tonight my family and I helped sort donated items for a garage sale that my community is having this weekend, to raise $ for the new hall. So I took some of my clutter there: an IKEA bird house that I never got around to painting, a fancy restaurant-like cheese grater that I won at a Christmas party, some picture frames that I haven't used in years.

[Mmmmmm! Have you ever added cinnamon hearts to your hot chocolate? You should cuz it's delish.]

Anyway, while helping prepare for the garage sale I met a lovely young family who was dropping off some quality vertical blinds that Good Will had turned down. Good Will had told them "to throw them in the landfill". They really thought that was a waste, so they brought them to donate to our sale. But I had to tell them about Freecycle. I joined one called Earthcycle, but the idea is the same: to keep stuff out of the landfills by offering it to people who could use it. It's free to use. All offers list the item and the area of the city that you live in and people respond via e-mail and you pick someone and set up for them to come get the item. The items run from a package of coffee filters that are the wrong size to bunk beds, an apple tree for the picking to an ipod. I seriously saw an ipod one time; doesn't that guy have a friend who doesn't have an ipod? You can also post "Wanted" pleas. But if you're in Edmonton, I want you to click on this link for Earthcycle and sign up (don't get the e-mails sent to you; just visit the postings online) and try it. If you aren't in Edmonton, try clicking Freecycle and see if your area has one. The Edmonton Earthcycle site is dying but after looking into the link right now, I see that there is also an Edmonton Freecycle and it is getting more traffic (600 postings int he last week v.s. 200 for Earthcycle) . In the past I've posted an old ironing board that had a new cover, an art easel, a small fish tank, and an indoor tree. People responded, I picked one to come get it and told them I'd leave the item on my step on the evening that they said they'd come by and BOOM! Clutter gone and conscience calm. Because I don't like the idea of perfectly usable stuff in the landfill, either.

Professional Carpe Diem-er

In June I did not hike, but our family went for a couple of short hikes in the mountains in Jasper in July. In July I didn't do much that would be classified as art but I did organize a craft for the cousins at our family reunion and do portraits. In August I did not bike but my DH took 5 minutes to teach our 5 year-old to ride her two-wheeler, and he organized a 'bike rodeo' for 22 children in the neighbourhood - it was fantastic, complete with a jello mould of a pinky-grey brain and safety vests. So that's my retro-active list of accomplishments in my unobserved areas of focus. Butt what I DID do was carpe diem. I was able to really value life and embrace what it had to offer. I looked around and recognized activities that I wanted to do, and I did them. I booked a 1-hour rafting trip in Jasper. 

I bought a family membership to the art gallery. I took a bike ride in the river valley with my DH. I took my 4 children to WEM... by myself - that's pretty adventurous for me. I basked in the delight that my DD radiated when she got her ears pierced. Funny story: the second night that she had real earrings in, having done her time with the original studs, my DH and I were out on a date. Just as dessert arrived, my cel. phone rang. My DD wailed into my ear, "but my bwaddohs don't know how to get my eawings out!" After instructing and encouraging said "bwaddohs" we returned home at the end of our date to find her sound asleep, on her back, in her "sweddoh" AND her jeans AND her socks since she couldn't get her tight-necked sweater over her head with her earrings still in... I don't know how that affected her inability to get out of her jeans. Age 5 and she's already been introduced to the price of vanity. Tee hee.

AND I finally got around to the job of re-painting the trim and doors upstairs - that professional painter/handy woman goal that I skipped so many times. I don't have a large house, but what I recognized is that I can have a well cared for house. A house that shows pride of ownership. A tidy, clean, uncluttered, creatively decorated house. Now that my youngest has begun kindergarten (sigh) I'm going to work this month (professional home organizer!) to streamline this house. I now have a label maker, so I'm ready! And our community is having a garage sale to raise money for the new community hall, so perhaps I can declutter my  house AND help them out.

How did you carpe diem this summer?

Seriously professional

I am so glad that I chose to focus on photography this month, AND that I remembered that I chose to focus on photography this month! I'm excited about these photos! I took my new zoom lens to the park on holiday Monday (during the 90 minutes of warm weather - blah!) and got some great shots that I can use in the family calendar for 2011. My in-laws were in town for the week so I'm happy that I got some photos of them and the children. Now I've spent 2 hours fixing up a handful of photos. I'm a little bitter that I have to address each photo that I want to use but must credit Pioneer Woman and Rita at CoffeeShop (see banner on side) for their rocking actions that they give for FREE. Okay, I just visited The Pioneer Woman's website and she's starting to upload her photos SOOC (straight out of camera) to save time...hmmm.

Here I go:

[DH gave me these orchids for Mother's Day, along with a wonderful Greek meal and other kindnesses. I used CoffeShop's Orton action. All I can say is that you have to try it!]

[S + E love it when Grandpa and Grandma visit because they bring Lady! This is CoffeeShop's Johnna's Memories of Sunshine action, contrast on.]

[Now we're into the park pics. Geese, geese and more geese. I used Pioneer Woman's Lovely action.]

[Seriously. Don't you wish that you had a picture with your grandma that was this awesome?]

[Yaaaaaaay! Middle Boy got a perfect picture feeding the geese. Phew. That should save me a few dollars in therapy costs.]

[Ya. Oldest brother didn't get a goose picture, but at least it's a flattering picture... after I cropped his BF out... and whitened his teeth a bit. tee hee. Good looking boy.]

[Don't jump to conclusions: I think that he's just adjusting his athletic protector. He did wear one to Gr.1 last week and told the kids that if they didn't believe he was wearing a "steel diaper" that they could tap on it... NOW you can try to draw a conclusion.]

[I think he's yelling at geese. But look at the super cool composition and how I framed them in the reflected light. If he'd been "adjusting his athletic protector" again, I'd STILL have included this photo.]

[The father and mother of my DH, relaxing with their dog. Perfect with a boost from Pioneer Woman's action "Boost".]

[Grandpa's little baby]

[I'm loving situating people in the bottom of the frame. This one could have used a little more tree up above. Next time. That's a joke. What are the chances of my husband and his father playing croquet on my lawn while the mock crabapple is in bloom? I'm thinking April or May for the 2011 calendar.]

One cleft closed

To conclude my "cultivating" profession for April I just donated the amount that Operation Smile says will cover a cleft palate surgery. And even with my sore back, I was able to rally the troops and get our vegetable garden planted yesterday. It was sunny after a week of rain and COLD. It worked pretty slick: we split the kids into pairs and every 10 minutes the timer would go off and they would swap from jumping on the trampoline to working in the garden. They got so involved in gardening that a couple gave up their trampoline time to keep at the task they were on. So everything is in except for the cucumbers (but the hills are waiting, thanks to the shoveling talents of GG) and the tomato plants. So the gardening actually got done.

As far as cultivating self-discipline, I definitely took some baby steps in the right direction. I even IRONED! I slept in until 7:50 two of the mornings, but I'm going to keep up with my goal of 7:45 and maybe even try 7:30!! one morning. My DH says that all the action is between 7:30 and 7:45. I don't wanna miss the "action"!

So I'm a professional photographer for May. EXCITING! I still haven't taken my new zoom lens on a true test drive so I'm looking forward to doing that! With baseball and soccer starting tomorrow, I should have LOTS of opportunities.

There are more hours in my day

Well, I haven't missed a day yet. Only 5 days to go until I meet my goal of earning $240 for Operation Smile. It is 3:45 in the afternoon but I have a new goal for my self discipline. It has been HARD to stay away from the computer when I've been bored in the afternoon, but I have done it and have found more productive ways to pass the time.

So I'm going to update my goal to:

1. no surfing the internet between 2 and 8 p.m., but I can take 10 minutes to check email/Facebook if I haven't been on much that day. Everything in moderation, right?
2. keep getting up by 7:45 a.m. I even did it on Saturday! I know you're rolling your eyes, butt remember: BABY steps!
3. NEW GOAL for this week: say morning prayers every day. I'll be a monk in NO time!

Awesome. I'm so excited I'm lizzing (30Rock)!

The seeds have been planted

The seeds of my self-discipline have been planted! I have successfully completed one week of no web surfing, no Facebook visiting, and no email writing between the hours of 2 and 8 p.m. And as an added bonus, the time that I DID spend doing those things was greatly reduced (As my neighbour will attest to: she was quite concerned when I didn't answer her email immediately. Haha.). What I did accomplish was planning my monthly meals for the first time in too long, did so much laundry that my dryer conked out, put away all the winter wear and got out the flip flops, made granola for the first time in too long, gave my husband a break from putting the kids to bed, among other things.

$80.01 earned for Operation Smile.

So I am adding a new challenge for myself this week: to get up at 7:45 a.m. every weekday. This is where I'm grateful that this blog has brilliantly light traffic so that few people will know my secret: my husband gets the kids ready for school. Once he's done, has kissed me good bye and is out the door, I get up. Don't tell anyone. He's pretty happy to do it primarily because then he doesn't have to deal with me in the morning and he likes to protect the children. . . from me in the morning. I'm not a morning person. Butt if I get up at 7:45 I could have breakfast with them and then get myself ready and they still wouldn't really have to deal with me, but I'd get an earlier start to my day.

[ Here's my enabler, taken with my new Canon 70-200mm f/4L USM Lens. Yippee!! ]

[ I have a zoom lens, prairie boy. Beware. ]

Wish me (and everything in my path at 7:45 Monday morning) luck!

Planting seeds of hope

Gardening is what I planned for April. I've already weeded and cleaned up the beds around the 'courtyard'. Half are south facing and the tulips and daffodils are 2 decimeters tall, in some cases. Yes, decimeter. haha. There is rain (or snow) in the forecast for today, but if the forecast is wrong...maybe I should phrase it as: IF the forecast is RIGHT, I won't have to water. Our May day tree is starting to bud which brings me hope.

In keeping with this year's tradition of  loosely interpreting my professional goals, I'm going to work on CULTIVATING myself, as well as my garden. I've done a couple Septembers of being a professional monk in an attempt to develop to self-discipline. It didn't work. HELLO! I lack the self-discipline to develop self-discipline!

Yesterday, while sick, I watched a program promoting Operation Smile. For $240 a volunteer medical team, using donated materials, can repair a cleft lip and palate in 45 minutes. In poor countries, these children have no hope of affording the operation and their disfigured faces prevent them from going to school because they get mistreated and often can't communicate clearly. The parents' sacrifice to bring their children to the clinic and then their gratitude was so touching. The idea that I could pay myself for developing self-discipline and donate the money to Operation Smile popped into my noggin. So my goal is to pay for 4 children's smiles this year. Now to figure out where to start so that I can achieve this lofty self-discipline goal with my self-discipline-less brain. Baby steps! (click to link to "What About Bob" clip - love it!). My original thought was to pay myself for doing housework but that is really too lofty (sorry, DH) so I am going to start by denying myself screen time from 2 to 8 pm. Every. Day. For the month of April. There are 3 weeks left in April so I'll pay myself $11.43 a day. I can't miss a day or else I won't earn enough to buy a smile this month. Hmmmm, I feel good about this. The thing I like about this first baby step is that it just creates a void in my day that I can fill with the good things that I should be doing instead of killing time in front of one screen or another. And once I start doing good things, I'll feel more hopeful that I can make a habit out of doing good things.

I'll keep you posted.

My most popular tradition: procrastination!

I have not done a traditions book. More about that later.

I mentioned the "celebration plate" when I was writing about cheerleading. Now that I'm writing about traditions, I thought I'd include a pic. Our last initial is a G so I wrote G words around the edge: great, good, gregarious, etc. I don't know why it is so . . . fancy. I went into the ceramics studio with a plan to use bold colors, maybe put a funky star in the middle but somehow got sucked in by the muted oatmeal glaze and before I knew it the stars were growing off of elegant leaves. NEXT time, a fun plate. Anyway, this is the plate that comes out for every birthday, when someone gets straight A's on their report cards (kinda awkward when they all do - have I mentioned that my DH has a huge brain?), when swimming levels get passed or someone is just crazy considerate to their sibling.

So I downloaded Picaboo with the plan to make this traditions book, but the Picaboo shows me all of my pictures with this hideous blue cast like they are from the 70's and I'm having a hard time believing that they are going to print normally (scapegoat alert) so I've decided just to include tradition pages in with my children's regular scrapbook. I already have some traditions scrapbooked, and my last brilliant thought was to include a few recipes. Like of this perfect sugar cookie recipe that I use for Valentine's Day and snowflake cookies. We melt Jolly Ranchers or Werthers butter scotches in the middle.

And I recognized that the Mentos/pop rocket launch has become a family vacation tradition whenever we are at a snowy destination.

[2009 and then 2010 - but the sense of danger that is written on DH's face makes me giggle. See the rocket that was launched in the top of the screen?]

It was fun focusing on traditions last month. We had a family discussion on the topic and K decided that eating tuna fish for Sunday lunches would be a good tradition, so he made sure that happened every Sunday in March. G suggested that we go out to a restaurant on the Saturday evenings before Fast Sunday to help us remember, which I thought was a great idea. And there were 3 great tradition comments left on my last post which were great. Please add your favorite tradition, too.

Tradition!

I've decided to call myself a sociologist this month. . . I didn't know if this fits so I googled the word. I found a rather stuffy definition, which follows: 
"Sociologists study human society and social behavior through the prism of group formations and social, political, religious, and economic institutions. How individuals interact with each other within given contexts, the origin and development of social groups are important indices by which the sociologist conducts his research and draws conclusions."


OK.


And a more casual one:
"Sociology is the systematic study of how human societies shape the lives of people who live in them. People make lots of decisions in the course of living every day. But we make these decisions within the context of "society;" our family, school, nation and the larger world. The essential wisdom of sociology is; the social world guides our life choices just as the seasons influence our selection of activities and clothing."


The definitions mentioned family and studying human behavior, so I think it's a fine profession to choose as I document and, perhaps, invent some family traditions. My goal is to make an 8x8 photobook about our family traditions. I've begun by writing out all of the holidays and what we do so far to celebrate them. I am already at 16 events with traditions. What I think I need to examine or invent are non-holiday related traditions. Something that we did last June that was SO fun was on the last day of school, we had the car packed and we picked the children up from school and drove 3 hours to a hotel with a great pool and slide and spent what was left of the evening enjoying that. Then we went to the fantastic Calgary Zoo on Saturday and drove home after supper. It was such a celebration of school ending and summer starting what with the excitement already inherent in school ending and summer starting. We could make that a family tradition.

[Yup, that totally is a hippopotamus butt on the right.]

[The twins staring down the gorilla.]

[I know - why does the little train make them so happy?!?]

Please leave me one of your favorite family traditions in the comments section. I'll be randomly drawing from those who comment, and the winner will receive a handmade glass bead bracelet from the Bead Tree. . . Not really, but that's what a really popular blogger would do. You can click on the link and see what you might win in my imaginary world. :)

Measure twice. . . correctly

February is over and I am (almost) finished G's bedroom. I didn't take before pictures (What can I say? I just get so eager to begin that I can't stop to take a picture) but imagine a room that IS a queen size bed (there's only room to walk around one side and the foot of said bed) and a closet that is at the foot of the bed and runs close to the width of the room. Not even room for a dresser. That was the 'before'. NOW the bed is in what was formerly-known-as-the-closet, but is now an alcove for the bed. It was a perfect opening for the bed, even allowing for space on each side to make it (not that my 12-year-old would ever consider doing THAT!)

Here's the "after" pictures (yes, I made the bed) minutes before I put up the valance. I measured for the side shelves (twice, each side separately noting that there was a 0.5" difference between the sides yet just told the guy cutting the shelves the ONE shorter length so I would trouble him with TWO numbers and now have some short shelves. . . ), and then my dear daddy came over and put some 2x2 brackets up. Then I had a piece of rough plywood cut for the top shelf and put it up by myself (I did get some bruises on one shoulder, and my lip sweat.) I covered the bottom of this faux ceiling with fabric that I already had, and put a remnant of vinyl flooring on top. It felt so great to use up existing supplies/clutter. Most everyone in the family helped by painting (4 coats later - never painting with red again).

Now with the valance that I sewed tonight and hung with the help of a staple gun. I'm going to have to take it down when I paint the trim. . . it could happen; especially since I've looked at these 'after' pictures and seen how terrible the unpainted trim looks. Imagine it being a crisp white.

And finally, some extraneous shelves inspired me to get shelving cut for the hallway closet. Again, no 'before' picture, so just imagine a pit of despair trapped in a closet, but now. . . 

Brilliant! This is the first time that we've had a home for our vacuum. I know it doesn't seem like much, but it is much. I need to get back to the never ending work of decluttering.

Digiscrapping links

So I taught another intro to digital scrapbooking, using Photoshop Elements. I love teaching and I love digi-scrapping so it really was fun. I just remembered my idea to post the links from my hand-out and now I wish I'd thought of this early instead of wasting my time vacuuming (tee hee) because as I'm posting links, I'm finding new sites and thinking of new links to post but my time is running out!! Well, here's a drop in the bucket.

PHOTOGRAPHY

• The Pioneer Woman: This woman is a self-taught, brilliant photographer - she explains techniques as she discovers them. Read and learn, baby. Here is a direct link to "Fresh & Colorful" ; possibly the most valuable (and yet SIMPLE!) method I've ever learned for taking my photos to a professional level. D.LISH!

ACTIONS

• The Coffee Shop blog [insert chorus of angels here]. I'm just going to lead you to the list of actions and you will have to set some time aside to look through them, and follow her instructions for installing them. And if you love her stuff as much as I have, please donate to her site.

DIGITAL PAPERS AND KITS:

• Search engine for free digi stuff (formerly Digifree, now is Craft Crave)
• Two peas in a bucket Last I checked there were 74 free kits
• Shabby Princess Two dozen good lookin' free digital kits!!
• Gunhilde This woman is creating and giving away the exact elements that I'm looking for
• Three Paper Peonies Her freebies are on the right side column
• The Daily Digi Okay, you gotta spend $5 but you get a tonne of stuff from a group of designers that are featured that month - you might discover a new designer that you love.

TEMPLATES:

• Mandagirl Her vacation set is so wonderful. If you reference her blog, you can see how she used the templates she is giving away (for free - have you noticed the theme, here?!?)
• Simply Yin This woman inspires me - the way that she makes haphazard look so organized almost brings me to tears. She's been designing in a more linear manner, as of late, but you can also visit her store for some affordable non-linear templates.
• Simple Scrapper Start with their database of free templates, but then check out the rest of the site, because it's a wealth of knowledge for those getting started.

There is so much more out there!!! I hope that my class inspired you to try out digital scrapbooking and I hope that these sites help you along your way.

Cheers!

Handywoman, I am.

I'm supposed to be a professional house painter. I've been a professional handywoman before. Well, I've scheduled the month for me to work on this area; I've never actually DONE anything. I didn't tile the basement bathroom (yes, I have the tile and the adhesive AND the grout). And I didn't paint the trim in the basement. So I wrote down "house painter" hoping that the new title would help me make things happen. My plan was to wash all the trim and doors in my house and then paint them. I have started washing . . . but then I got sidetracked. I decided to convert our guest room into a fourth bedroom so that my second son won't have to share with my first son anymore. This guest room only fits a queen size bed. NOTHING else, but it does have a big closet. Sooooooo, my husband took the doors off the closet, and we emptied it (now it looks like a closet threw up in our family room) and we slid the bed into the opening. I had considered removing the framing for the closet, but then the drop ceiling would have to be redone, and we just put vinyl flooring in, blah, blah, blah. So I kept thinking and came up with:

I already have 1L of bright red paint, which my son loves, and orange primer so the inside of the "closet" is going to be bright red, baby. The rest of the room is a boring tan, but I'll liven it up with the bedspread. I've measured and know what size I need cut for shelves, so his alarm clock and books can be within arms reach. Then one long shelf will run the full width of the closet, just under the electrical box. That'll be for some storage. We'll hide it (and the electrical box) with a valance; some fabric-as-art idea. Above it is room for one vinyl quote. I don't know that "if you think you can, you can. If you think you can't you're right" is the right quote for over the guest bed that my in-laws frequent, so I'll have to keep thinking. ;)

And by pushing the bed into the closet we freed up ample space to put a 175 cm wide wardrobe (likely a PAX unit from IKEA - They sell for 10% of the retail price in the as-is section and since they are having a sale on them right now, lots of people will be buying them. . . and then returning them after getting it half assembled because you know it's too much work! I've gotta get over there soon!).

Bonne nuit!

My 2010 professional plan

Alright! It's February. I just finished being a professional historian (scrapbooker) in January.

February: House painter (window trim, doors, bathroom, laundry room)

March: Sociologist (make an 8x8 book of our family traditions - I need reminders!)

April: Gardener (water early!)

May: Photographer (can't wait to photo-edit!)

June: Hiker

July: Artist

August: Biker

September: Home organizer

October: Monk (self-discipline is not beyond my reach!)

November: Artisan/shopper

December: Events Planner

Leave me a comment about what professions you have planned!

Surreal

I pretty much post a blog for myself. It makes me feel young and hip to say that I have one. And it's always a wonderful surprise to find a comment left on said blog. Butt I never thought that I'd see the comment that I saw yesterday morning. After going onto my computer with the purpose of posting an update here, I got sidetracked by a game on Facebook. Bad, Samber. By the time I remembered the reason I had gone on the computer in the first place, it had gotten so late that I wanted to go to bed. Grrrrrrr! Well, I had planned to post, so post I would. I was too tired to post all that I wanted, or to make it clever, but I finished it up about 11:00 Sat. night.

Sunday morning I checked emails and there was one from "Ali" via my blog.

You can go look at my previous post and see it for yourself. You can click on "Ali" and it will take you to Ali Edwards' blog. Now I don't know that Ali Edwards truly commented on my blog but maybe she did. That's surreal. I told my husband that it would be like Michael Jordan coming to his men's league game. I'm not a celebrity person. I'm not into 'famous'. When asked which celebrity I'd like to have lunch with, I don't have an answer. But I think it's really cool that my favorite designer/scrapbooking super hero visited my blog (maybe . . .tee hee).

And I am embarrassed that she saw that poorly designed header of mine. Haha.

Well, enough of the surreal, and back to the real. I thought that I would post a few more scrapbook pages from this month, and my 2010 family calendars (I do one for each side of the family).

(credits: Mandagirl vacation template, paislee press "in good company" kit) I need to add the dates and journalling. Pictures taken by Pauli.

(credits: mandagirl template, papers mostly Shabby Princess)

(credits: papers Jessica Sprague and some freebies off of designerdigitals, scraplifted the layout by nana z.)

Baaaaaha! I'm thinking 16x20 canvas frame. . . B is for booger-bubble. This made it into the family calendar on my husband's side. (credit: frame inspired by Ali Edwards' design)

WiFi @ the scrapbook store

I've planned my professions for the year, but you're going to have to wait to see my list. Okay, I'm not keeping it from you, I just have to find the list and stop playing Bejeweled Blitz on Facebook long enough to type it in (They say that they have 'improved' Bejeweled Blitz, but it's not true).

January is my professional scrapbooking month (historian, whatever). I usually do decluttering (home organizer) for January, but was in a bit of a funk in the beginning of the year, so I opted for a funner choice (I know 'funner' is not a word - it's just my way of letting my sister know that I'm thinking of her). So did a 2-page spread of Christmas. . .

and started some pages about the childrens' grandparents. I love digital because I'm going to

use one layout design for many spreads (one for each grand parent or great-grandparent couple), then unify the spreads with matching papers. To personalize the pages for each of my children, I'll put pictures of that child with that grandparent.

My lovely neighbour and friend organized a scrapbooking night at a local scrapbooking store. The crop nights are on Fridays from 6 to midnight and the socializing is so fun and sometimes the food is great butt I've been bummed (ha ha - butt and bummed in the same sentence) as I've been finishing up with old printed photos because I really love digital scrapbooking. My background is graphic design and I love that you can do multiple copies and I've never been much of an embellisher (Ali Edwards is one of my favorite scrapbooking super heroes). So, I thought I was going to be trapped in my basement doing my pages, butt then my hubby bought an Apple laptop for work. . . and then he put PSE on it. . . and then he got a portable hard drive. . . and then I got assertive and phoned the scrapbooking store to ask if they minded if I worked on a laptop (well, I wouldn't be buying any of their supplies now, would I?) and THEN I asked if, perchance, they had WiFi. . . they do (rather anticlimactic what with the title of this entry, but exciting, nonetheless). So I had a LOVELY evening just being happy that I can continue to socialize and scrapbook (and Google answers for all of the questions that came up in our discussions). And I did have fun doing a page about myself.

All of my digi supplies were FREE. Credits: 'Christmas' template 167 from simply yin, and then paislee press No.15 template for 'me'. The papers for both are from 3 paper peonies.