Project Life: Week 4

I have a confession to make: I have no desire to scrapbook right now!  Oh NO!!  I'm more interested in Project Life and knitting right now.  And reading.  I have tried so many times to scrapbook this week and nothing comes to me.  Do you ever have those times?  Please tell me I'm not alone!  I wish the desire would show up again because I am getting behind.  I wish I would have started Project Life last year because I think it would have helped me scrap all of the darling photos I would like to scrap.  I think what I need to do is really really cut back on what I scrap and just scrap those photos that mean the MOST.  I can do this!  I will conquer this.  Ha!

And even with Project Life I still feel like my pages are boring.  But to be honest, I am welcoming the simplicity.  It just works for me right now.

Well, I must sign off now and get creative with a poopy diaper!

Project Life: Week 3

Hello!  How are you keeping up with your Project Life so far?  So far I don't feel like I'm behind, but there are other things I'm getting behind on.  Oh well.  I have to say that I'm feeling some relief by doing this project because I know pictures are getting scrapped!

I realized that I forgot to change last week's spread to "week 2".  Look at the previous post and you will notice my mistake.  Oops!  I found another mistake I will need to fix too.  I'm figuring all of this out.  Good thing I'm starting out simple!  I still don't feel confident...but I'm getting there.  I think I need to build up my supplies.  But I will not go back and change these pages...no way.

Another thing I'm noticing is that I am terrible at journaling about our week.  I feel like I don't know what I want to say.  So many some weeks will be more like lists of what we did.  That's sort of what I did for this week.  I'll get there!

Project Life: Week 2

I'm back with Week 2 of Project Life.  I had these two pages on my Photoshop desktop for days.  I don't feel confident about this project.  I don't feel like I've found my style with it yet.  I know I'll get there though. I was looking at a gallery of Project Life pages on Designer Digitals and I really like how some have totally gone out of the box and have done their own version of it.  But I think I will stay on the path I have started and continue on since I do like the original templates for Project Life.

Project Life: Week 1

So Blogger is still being bad.  I can't post pictures like I normally do, but thankfully Photobucket exists!

 

I'm still trying to figure out how I want to do this project.  I have a few templates ready to use. I also want to stay consistent with the embellishments.  I have always enjoyed seeing how Susan does Project Life.  Her approach is simple and clean.  I appreciate that because if I'm going to do something like this, I need simple and clean because I don't have a lot of extra time.  I'm excited about this project because we take so many pictures and there is no way I can highlight them in a separate scrapbook page all of the time.  So this is a great way to still have the photos on a page, but without going too crazy!  Ha!  I may change things a bit as I go along until I find my groove.  I like this first week, but I'm not completely settled.  And I really hope I don't get too behind.  I am just so excited!

 

Products used:

 

3x4 Calendar cards 2013

 

Circle Messages Vol. 1

 

Hello Life Boxes Brushes

 

Beach Outline Banners and Stamps 

 

Pocket Pages Layered Templates No.4

 



 

Food

Hello! Happy New Year!  I know...I'm late!  I have really good excuses though!  *smile*

Yesterday I tried to post some Project Life pages, but Blogger was being bad, so maybe I'll try again today.  But for now I have something else on my mind.  I've been comtemplating for a long, long time whether I want to "go there" about this subject on my blog.  I feel so strongly about this right now, so I'm going to step onto my soap box for a moment and share what's on my heart.  This is probably the first time I have "gone there" and it may be the last--who knows!

Anyway, here it goes...

I am so tired of all of the dieting mentalities and opinions out there on food.  There are SO many opinions on what food is good, bad, will make you live longer, will make you healther, will make you stronger, will fill you up, bring you down, cheer you up, make you fatter, make you thin, make you feel like you have more energy--and blah, blah, blah.  I feel like my mind and eyes have been poisoned by all of it. 

People, it's just food!  Sure, food has healing components (if that's even the word), but it's NOT our healer.  Sure, you will probably feel better after eating a grilled chicken salad instead of a juicy burger with fries (although you may still be hungry after the salad--that's just my experience). 

I feel like my head hurts at times from all of the confusing information out there about food. 

Why am I even talking about this?  Because lately I have been struggling with it.  Again.  Again?  Yes, years ago I really struggled with food stuff.  I wasted SO much time reading and researching about eating, dieting, losing weight, yada, yada.  And finally I realized that what I needed was to listen to my body and also be aware of portion.  Oh, and to exercise--which just means movement.  But recently I have allowed myself to go down that path of worrying about food again.  It's been actually a miserable experience.  So today I have decided to let it all go...again. 

I have seen countless people go on diets, only to gain all of the weight back.  You know what my theory is?  They weren't eating what they really enjoyed, so that's why the diet failed.  It won't last.  Deprivation kicks in and then when you are around that food you start to go crazy.  I've been there.  I've done that.  Over the years I have given myself permission to eat all sorts of foods.  Nothing is bad.  Sometimes I even eat pie/cake for breakfast.  Sometimes I even make pie for dinner.  I'm not kidding! 

As soon as people start labeling food as "good" and "bad" I just want to plug my ears and run.  You can certainly eat what you enjoy, but what it comes down to is portions.  I do track what I eat.  I need to visualize it.  I need to see it.  It's just how I am and it works for me.

I don't even know how to tie this into what I have talked about on this blog before.  I could tie it to the fact that you have to be you and like what YOU like to eat and not allow the unwavering opinions throw you off course.  I could tie it to the fact that everyone is different (I'm talking body size/composition) and how comparing ourselves is only destructive. 

I do like to feel good about myself.  So I track what I eat and I exercise.  I like that.  But I don't like when I start to dig too deep and find myself lost in the dieting mentality.  So I'm climbing my way back up through and finding air again.  Thank you, LORD!

So here I go...back to being balanced, back to enjoying ALL foods, and back to being ME!

Sweet Girl

Hello!  I don't have much to report, just wanted to share this page:

 

Monthly Journal

Remember how I said I wanted to do monthly journal pages once Jeralyn turned a year old?  Well, I had these great intentions of doing so, but then time got away from me.  I absolutely loved doing the weekly journal because she changed SO much the first year, and literally each week she did new things and learned new skills--and I have it all captured in photos/words.  I'm SO thankful I kept up with it!  Well, a few months after she turned 1 year, I realized I hadn't done much as far as continuing with her journal, so I made myself sit down and type out what I could remember her doing since she turned a year old.  I'm SO glad I did!  And because we take a gazillion photos, it's easy to look back and see what she was doing.

 

I'm not sure how long I will do a monthly journal/scrapbook page...but my goal will be at least until her second birthday.  And then I will re-evaluate.  And I'm trying to make these pages as simple as possible.  I will use only ONE photo, which means I will pick my favorite photo of her from the month (this could be difficult) and use that as center stage for the page.  This is the first month:

 

 

 

I have a draft in my email account that I use to type my journal notes.  It started out as a list.  Last night I sat down and expounded upon the list, creating sentences and eventually one paragraph.  This is similar to what I did for her weekly journal.  It's a lot of reading, but hopefully one day she will appreciate it. 

 

Actually, the other day I let her look through her journal.  She was just having fun turning the pages, but she did notice things, like "kitty".  It's so cute to see her enjoying her baby album!

 

I also still plan to do a digital version of Project Life.  And then after that and monthly pages, I may not do too many separate scrapbook pages along with that.  I'm not sure.  I want to simplify, simplify, simplify because I don't have a LOT of time...but I need some time to be creative.  I was telling Quent that I don't feel like myself if I don't scrapbook.  Ha!  It's a very important outlet.  *wink*

Family Photo

Happy Monday to you!

 

A few days ago I started this page (another 8-1/2x11) and I just couldn't get it to work for me.  I had to walk away and I'm glad I did.  Sweet shoppe Design is having a Bargain Bites 50% sale through this month.  I'm not sure how often it changes, but the designers pick what they want in the sale and it changes throughout December.  I really liked Zoe Pearns' kit called Tis the Season.  Sometimes a page just needs something new to work with--and then it all comes together!  And of course I had to change some of the colors on the paper/elements using the hue/saturation tool because I wanted more pink.  I love how this turned out!

 

This was a picture my mom helped take back in March.

 

Ski Baby

Hello!  It's hard to believe it's almost 2 weeks until Christmas!  And 2 weeks from my birthday!  Whoa!  And I'm still in denial that it's actually December.  Anywho...here's a page I finished up yesterday morning.  It holds one of my favorite pictures we have of Jeralyn.  I just want to kiss her sweet little lips!  And her pointed finger!  She's so CUTE!

 

Gray with snowflakes

Does that describe your December?  It does as of yesterday, except it wasn't gray, it was partly cloudy.  It's nice to have a little snow, and it's beautiful on the mountains!

 

I've really been into gray as of late.  I realize I like to scrapbook on a neutral background.  This last week my "go to" has been gray.  And the wonderful thing about digital scrapbooking is that you can change any colored paper to gray because of the hue/saturation.

 

For these pages I used Katie Pertiet's Bunny Slope.

 

 

Sun Shine

It's been awhile since I've made an 8-1/2x11 page.  I'm working on another one, but I got stuck.  I've actually been scrapbooking a little bit here and there the last few days; it's been nice!

 

 

I have an update on the play kitchen we were going to build for Jeralyn.  Turns out it was going to be quite spendy.  We went to the hardware store to pick up a few items for the project.  After about 20 minutes we tallied up how much the items were in the basket I was carrying and we looked at one another like, "uhhh..."  It was then that we decided to just buy her a kitchen.  It was going to be cheaper AND already made, just have to put it together.  And free shipping!  Who can turn that down (especially when you live in Alaska!)?  So we put everything back and went home.  It was disappointing, but we felt good about our decision.

 

Guess what?  I'm almost done with one of the knitting projects I have been working on!!  Yeah!!  All I have to do is bind off and figure out what the directions are trying to say about stretching it out.

 

I have also decided that I am going to do Project Life.  And it will be digital.  I will post more details about that soon.

 

I have more pages to share...soon!

Tears

Hello!  Happy Monday (but it feels like Tuesday).  I can't believe we are in the last month of this year!  Crazy!

 

Here's a page I created last week:

 

 

 

Have you done Project Life?  I'm considering doing it for next year, but I'm wondering if it's something I will actually be able to keep up with and/or if it's even worth it.  How do you know what supplies you want to use?  Or do you just get the kit and then stick to that?  Right now it seems overwhelming and complicated to me.  I have considered doing it digitally, but I was also thinking the traditional way might be fun, too.



Play Kitchen Sketch

So this isn't a stamping, scrapbooking, or knitting project, but it is a project...a building project.  Quent and I are going to make Jeralyn a play kitchen.  We don't want to go too crazy with Christmas gifts for our little girl, but it's almost hard not to.  Oops!  Originally, we were going to get her a couple of books (she LOVES books), a couple of stocking stuffers, a scooter car thing, and maybe some Duplos.  Well, I scratched the Duplos idea when we were recently visiting at my inlaws.  My 22 month old nephew has a play kitchen and Jeralyn just loved it!  She played with it and it's accessories a lot!  He has Duplos too, but she just tossed them around.  Haha!  Maybe for her birthday...  So I started looking for some kitchens on Amazon.  They tend to be rather spendy, so I had to keep on searching.  My dear friend Carrie suggested that maybe we could build our own.  I think I honestly laughed out loud when she told me that.  Maybe if I was sipping water I would have spit it out--it was one of those reactions.  Me?  Build a play kitchen?  My husband is waaaay to busy for that.  The excuses flowed.  She encouraged me to look on Pinterest for ideas.  Haha...maybe.  But I did!  And soon I was in this whirlwind of DIY (do it yourself) play kitchens.  Now I'm obsessed!  I'm glad I took Carrie's advice because now we are on our way to building this thing.  After looking at ideas on Pinterest I sketched this out:

 

It's not to scale, but it's close.

We will be transforming this entertainment stand into the kitchen.  Tonight we will start cutting and maybe start painting real soon.  I will take a lot of pics and show the progression.  Stay tuned!

 

P.S. That basket is where I keep my current knitting projects and knitting tools.  And it's stored most of our DVDs, which I moved to some shelves yesterday.  It all lives downstairs in our "family room".

Knitting here and there

I currently have 3 knitting projects going.  Here are some glimpses:

 

A beaded shawl.  Probably one of the most challenging projects I've done.  I was intimidated at first because I never did beading with knitting, but it's been surprisingly easy.  There are 300+ stitches each row and it's lace thread, so this is taking awhile (aka forever).  The picture doesn't really do justice to the beauty.

I knit this Christmas stocking for Jeralyn.  I'm NOT a sock knitter, but this was a fun project (and there was only ONE--I don't like knitting socks because you finish one and then have to do another--unless...oh never mind).  I simplified the project by just doing two colors, where the original pattern calls for 3 colors.  I should have taken a picture next to a penny to show scale.  You can find the FREE pattern here.  It took me about 2 days to knit this, but it would have been less time if I didn't have to pull out the toe part two times.  The 3rd time is a charm, right?  I really like this simple pattern.  I will probably use it for future children (future--when that time comes).  *smile*  Oh, and I just bought some purple sequins that I will sew onto the purple.  I will take more/better pictures (showing scale) once it's truly completed.

 

How about you?  Any projects you are trying to finish up this year?

Sweetie

Hello!  I just wanted to stop by to post this page.  Happy Thanksgiving [to those in the states]!

 

Sittin' Pretty

Hello!  I hope you all had a good week and are ready for the week ahead!  I'm ready to celebrate Thanksgiving Day and eat some turkey!  Yum!  I have so many things to be thankful for...so many people to be thankful for... 

 

I didn't create much in the scrapbooking realm this week, but my fingers have been busy with knitting.  I'm not used to having knitting "deadlines", but with Christmas right around the corner, the pressure is on!  I enjoy it though!  This is the time of year where the weather and less light create a perfect situation to sit, knit, and drink some warm tea or coffee with creamer.  I'm loving it!  Oh, and I can't forget to watch a movie either!  I need something for my eyes and ears to focus on while knitting.  I guess I like to involve all of my senses.  And lately I have been watching the Little House on the Prairie seasons (for probably the 20th time).  But today I think I must take a break from knitting just to give my wrists some relief.  I tend to get a knitting "injury" in my left wrist if I knit too much.  So sad!  Ha!

 

So maybe some scrapping will take place instead!

 

I created this page about a week ago:

 

My lil sunshine

This layout was inspired by a layout Kaleigh Wiles did from Designer Digitals.  She is such an inspiration to me when it comes to scrapbooking.  I just really enjoy her stuff!  And now her Studio-D templates are available and they are really a lot of fun.  I didn't use her template for this page though.  And speaking of Designer Digitals, they are having a 30% off sale for a week for their quarterly sale.  I took advantage of it today.  I had a bunch of stuff in my cart and was in disbelief when I saw the total.  Yikes!  I thought, "There must be something wrong with their site calculator!"  Ha!  So I had to take some stuff out and figure out what I really wanted.  Cough.

 

 

 

And can I say once again how extremely difficult it is to not scrapbook every picture of my little cutie pie?!  I had to skip over some pictures because they don't really exemplify anything except that she's just so stinkin' cute!  There are thousands of pictures that I have to pick from, so I am trying to make the wisest choices.  Ha!

Love this girl

I bet if I would have scrapped this page back in February/March of this year I would have been very emotional because it was a very emotional time right after my lovely appendectomy (surgery to remove my ruptured appendix).  It wasn't fun at all.  But the hardest part about it was being away from Jeralyn.  She did great, but I did NOT like being away from her when I stayed in the hospital.  It was a short time of 5-6 days, but at the time it felt like forever.  My body went through so much at the time and because of the medications, antibiotics, and just not feeling well, my body stopped producing for my nursing baby.  And then all of that combined with hormones because of all of that stopping--well, I was just a mess!  And then I couldn't lift her for 6 weeks!  When the doctor told me that I just started crying. 

 

 

But you know what?  It could have been so much worse!  When I was about 21 weeks pregnant I woke up in the middle of the night with extreme pain on my right side.  Quent was gone and the pain was so bad that I had to hunch over when I walked.  After maybe 2 days (have I ever mentioned that I'm quite stubborn?), I sent a prayer request out to family/friends and within a very short time the pain subsided.  At the time I (and my doctor) attributed it to round ligament pain, but honestly, I think it was my appendix.  I think it was doing something.  I am so thankful that God stopped all of that and held it together for me.  I don't even want to know what that would have been like to have a ruptured appendix during pregnancy.  So I count my blessings!

Grandpa

Hello!  Happy Monday!  I worked on this page this morning...

 

 

I'm feeling terribly behind *chuckle* on scrapbooking.  I look at all of the photos and think, "HOW am I going to pick my favorites?"  How?  I don't know, but I will figure something out.  I'm sort of going in chronological order, but also going with the flow.  Does that make sense?  I'm not in a rush by any means.  I want to capture those memories through photos that mean the most.  But even that's hard. Hmmm...

 

I feel like this blog has turned into "this is what I scrapped" and "this is where I'm at with scrapping photos" and blah, blah, blah.  I want it to be more.  So I'm trying to define what "more" means.

 

So in the mean time I will leave you with something I wrote out on paper and have it in my bathroom to remind me:

 

Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know your labor in the Lord is not in vain.  1 Cor. 15:58

Weeks 50, 51, & 52

Guess what???  I'm done scrapping her baby journal pages!!  Woot!  Woot!  And these last few pages had a turquoise them--oops!  I guess I just like the color.  *shrugs*

 

So I have officially decided to do a monthly journal for her second year.  There's just so many things that I want to write down and capture with journaling.  I debated about doing it because I hadn't been writing things down after her birthday.  But I started writing down things from memory the other day and I think I have a good foundation to work off of now.  Instead of doing a collage of pictures I will just pick one picture per page and then journal about what happened in her month.  I'm excited to get started!  But I'm also excited that I have completed the first year for her baby journal/album!   Yeah!