Digital Scrapbooking 101

This is my only way to share what I am working on. Digital scrapbooking has become my hobby and one of my goals in the coming year is to make enough pages to print a book at the end of the year for our memories.

Holiday Season

It has been a crazy week. I have been home all week with a sick baby. But somehow I have been able to keep up at work and still do what I need to around the house.


Christmas is only a week away and I am not ready at all. I try to make it exciting for the girls. Luckily, we have been "elfed" twice this week. So tonight we are going to pass it along. Its fun because even though Kaia knows the truth about Santa she still plays right along with everything to make it fun for Kiersten.

This time is always hard being away from my family. I wish we were closer so we could build some fun family traditions with them. For now it just has to be us.

The countdown begins.......

Thanksgiving - School Lunch Style

Its not that the food was so memorable - but the conversation. I waited for Kaia down at the lunchroom. As soon as she saw me, she ran and gave me a big hug and started guiding me to the line to get our food. We're standing there waiting and a little boy comes and and said "Kaia, is that your mom?" She said, "Yes - I told you I was mixed." I was a little taken back. Then we were sitting at the table eating lunch. Again the little boy said "Kaia, that's your mom? You don't look anything like her. She has straight hair." Kaia responded, "Yes." I looked at Kaia and asked her what she meant by being mixed. She proceeded to tell me that she is a mixture of me and her dad, and she gets her curly hair from her dad, but you wouldn't know it because he shaves all his hair off. Hmmmm...something to think about.

Fall Time

When I was growing up I have to say summer was my favorite time of year. Now that I am an older I have to admit that fall is now my favorite. I love the crisp cool air, the colors that mother nature blesses us with, the food and scents. I could just go on. We have been very busy which is normal for us but we took the day to spend it together and be outside after all the rain we keep getting. Halloween was a literal wash (rain, rain, and more rain). We hiked from the base of the falls to the top. Kiersten was such a trooper. She made it almost the whole way without us having to carry her. I am thinking about next year driving two cars. park one at the top and one at the bottom. Then we are covered.

Where does the time go?

I blink and the time is gone and it feels like October is flying away too. We are busy. Kiersten is loving school. She loves her teachers, Miss Kelly & Miss Barbara. She is already trying to convince me to have a friend over.

Kaia is growing up too fast.

Young Women & Knowledge

So I am the Personal Progress adviser at church. Every month I choose a different value to present on fast Sunday. This month is knowledge. I thought it appropriate because of everyone starting back to school. This is the story I am going to present to the girls and the handout I made to go along with it.

It seems that none of the crows knew how to fly. One of the crows was asked to give a talk in Sacrament meeting. He thought long and hard about it, but was having trouble coming up with a subject. (It seems the crows already knew just about everything!) One day, as he was crossing the street, he was so engrossed in thought that he did not see a car coming until the car honked. It was almost upon him and he had no time to run out of the way. He panicked so completely that he began to flap his wings furiously in the air. In doing so, he became airborne and lifted himself completely out of danger.

"Aha!" thought the crow. "I will give my talk on flying." So, when Sunday arrived, the crow dressed himself in his best clothes and went to church to teach the other crows to fly.

His talk was wonderful! He talked about the dynamics of flying, the methods of flight, flight patterns and on and on. He next invited the members of the congregation to practice flying. The young ones caught on most quickly, but before long there was not one member of the ward, even the most elderly, that did not know how to fly. They flew around the chapel, down the halls, into the classrooms and back. It seemed that they were born to fly! Every crow nodded their heads and declared the meeting a GREAT SUCCESS! They congratulated each other and slapped each other on the backs. Then, they gathered up their families and belongings...

...And they all walked home.

Weekend of Firsts

This weekend was full of firsts.............

Friday night I went out with the girls I have spending 3 nights a week with all summer at the gym. (first first) We went to have Sushi (2nd First). That was an experience. I have always shied away from sushi...........raw fish. No thanks! But I decided that I was going to try it and I did. Was it my favorite? No - but now I can say I have had it and I might try it again down the road.

This was my plate of Sushi. California Rolls and "I Love NY" Rolls. There was cream cheese, advacodo, seaweed, rice, fried shrimp, and salmon on top.


My girls at Lifetime.

Then our other first was taking Kaia to Girl Scout camp for the week. Yes, a little nervous and apprehensive. David more than me, but I know she is having fun. This is the first time Kaia has been away for more than one night. She is with her buddy Grace so I know she has a familiar face. You can see from the pictures that she was ready!

UGH!

I decided to work from home today so I could go see Kiersten's last ballet class. I should have just gone to work. I spent the whole 45 minutes sitting outside listening to her cry. Yes!!! I was frustrated.

This week has been a struggle - I try not to complain but it happens. Even to the best of us. I am trying to find that happy medium again but its getting a lot harder to locate. I'm spending most of the day tomorrow with my mother-in-law to get rid of whatever we have left of previous yardsales. God must be looking down on us because the humidity is suppose to be low with highs in the low 80s which will make it bearable to be outside.

4th of July

We spent the morning watching the Woodstock City Parade with friends.

Laid low and when it started to get dark we let off fireworks. Nice and low key. A great family day.

Its been a long time

Its been a long time.... no excuses I just don't feel like sharing a lot of what goes thru my mind at times.

Life is busy. Sometimes I wish it would stop but then I would probably complain about that as well. I just make sure that I am always putting one step in front of the other and somehow I make it. I try to stop and enjoy the moments I get with my girls. Sometimes its hard because I have so much that I need to do and so little actual waking time with them. I love bedtime because Kiersten just curls up next to me and we go to sleep but its the closest I am to her all day.

I have been blessed with my mother-in-law being willing to help with the girls. There are days that I get home and she has folded laundry or just straightened up. It is simple things that I am really appreciative of.

Our summre has flown by. We started it by flying out to Utah to spend some time with my family. It was so fun to be around everyone and let Kaia and Kiersten just play and play. Although Tasha doesn't believe me I do wish we were a lot closer and hold on to the hope that sameday it will happen. Kaia starts back to school in 3 weeks and its going to go fast. She is starting at a new school this year but hopefully won't be too big an adjustment because of the friends she has at school that are in the ward.

Anyways - David and I acutally took time our for ourselves last weekend and went to a concert. It was a 90s flashback with Next, SWV, and Raph Tresvant, Johnny Gill, & Bobby Brown. The night was perfect when the sun went down it was in the 70s and low humidity which is unusal here in Georgia. It was fun to sit back and enjoy some old school

Calloway Gardens

The weather was so beautiful this weekend we took advantage of it and went to Callaway Gardens. I can't believe I have waited 12 yrs to go there. It was so beautiful. There is a butterfly atrium. So many different plants and butterflies. Kaia and I were trying to sit still so that the butterflies would get close to us and possibly land on us. There were a lot of trails and gardens - it was fun to just be outside finally. I think the girls loved it. Kiersten kept talking about how she was looking for blues clues. It was so cute. Look at the pictures here.

Christams Catch up continues

Here are the rest of the pictures from the holiday season. I'm slow I know.

It's Finally Saturday

So I am here still trying to get work done. Why? Because yesterday was a total wash. I got a call at 6:15 am. The office had been broken in to. Great! Just the way to start a Friday. So I hurried and got over there. They had used a crowbar to get in and stole laptops and flat screen montiors. Luckily they didn't touch much of anything else. I get a good chuckle because 1 of the laptops was broken. I was messing with it earlier in the week and had left it on my desk. I think a new policy should be to hang more Radioactive Material signs around the office and make people more weary about coming in.

David was nice and when we got home built a fire outside and we enjoyed sitting out there watching the girls play. No rest for the weary. Today is just as jammed pack.

Christmas Catch Up

So I am sitting at the computer doing everything but preparing my primary lesson. That is why I am finally loading some pictures at Christmas.

This year we didn't go home but stayed here. I missed my family but enjoyed not having to travel anywhere. On Christmas Eve we had the Elders over for dinner and the girls put on a program. Then it was time for bed. We all fell asleep, except for Kiersten. Who know what time she finally gave up. David woke me up at 5am to play Santa - we did that and watched a movie (that doesn't happen often uninterrupted) before Kaia woke up - then we went and woke up Kiersten (she was not happy for the first 30 min).

Did I forget to mention that we made cookies for Santa as well?