Where'd you go, Deb?

Wow, it's just been crazy busy around our house the past couple of weeks. I've worked a bunch of nights, which is great for the paycheck, but not so much for creativity. Sleep just has to become the priority, along with making sure I give each of my kiddos some quality time.

The weather's getting crisp here in New England and the leaves are starting to change. I'm waiting a bit longer before I start snapping some foliage shots, though. The black bear in our neighborhood has been making a few more guest appearances in the woods near where I walk Harley. I have to confess I've been a bit spooked to walk the dog at night. Hope Mr. Bear hibernates soon.

The color yellow has been making me happy lately. I bought myself some new sneakers, and as soon as I saw these, I had to have them. I've decided to start walking when I can, and these make me feel more excited about it, LOL.




My Monday night CBS show have restarted. I was so excited that Horatio Kane was not killed off on Miami CSI. Even though he seriously overacts, I love David Caruso in this role. I just laugh at him sometimes. One of these days, I swear I am gonna count how many times he removes and reapplies his sunglasses in an episode. I bet the number will be over 20!

Tommy decided to boycott gymnastics classes last week. He flat out refused to go. I realized that he is probably to pooped to play on Thursday afternoons. He rides around the world all week while we drive the bigger kids to their activities. He goes to preschool 2 mornings a week. He generally does it all without a complaint. By the time Thursdays at 4pm roll around, he's had it. I figured I needed to give the little guy some downtime so we withdrew from the class. And I enjoyed taking a 2 hour nap with him on the couch. Message received, little man, loud and clear!

Speaking of Tommy... Here is a layout I made about him tonight. I did this for Challenge #3 in the Top Designer contest at Bad Girls:




I used their Sept kit for this page, which needed to have white space and demonstrate "less is more." Gasp! If you know me, you'll know that this was a HUGE challenge for me. But I'm so happy with how this turned out.

I really like the Glitz "table of elements" paper. I may need to get some more of it. Keeping fingers crossed that it will get me through to the next round.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

What's Up?

I've worked the past couple of nights. They were quiet shifts, which is always a pleasant change from the norm. I really enjoy the majority of the people I work with. We get giddy since we're all sleep deprived. When it's quiet, we all get laughing like crazy. One funny thing that happened last night...
One of my co-workers asked me to come in and help translate for a Spansh speaking patient she had. So the two of us are in the room with this woman, asking her about her baby, if she has any pain, is she using the breast pump, yadda yadda. That's when the patient passes gas. Loudly. Long winded. And she doesn't even blink . She doesn't look or act embarrassed. She just keeps talking like nothing happened. Yikes! I think my eyes popped out of my head as I stifled my giggle. Now I know, toots are a normal body function. But this one was loud and it had some hang time too it. Even if I'm a nurse, I can be a bit juvenille about these things. Needless to say, the girls and I laughed about this all night.

I scrapped tonight. Look for Challenge 12 to be up on Dreamgirls later today.
In the meantime, here is a layout I made for a contest over at Bad Girls. I was feeling down in the dumps when I scrapped it, so I don't think it's my best work ever. The assignment was to use layering on a page. I worked with bright colors to try and cheer myself up, and it did help. Not sure if it's good enough to move me on to the next level in the contest, but that's okay.







Okay, gotta run - it's late and I need to catch some ZZZZ's!

Sad tonight

I was flitting around on line tonight as I always do and discovered a post about Aleida Franklin.
I was on the DT at Scrapping the Music with her. Aleida was killed in a car accident on her way to work this morning. While I can't say I knew her well, I am able to say she was a warm and real person whose artwork truly inspired me. I am so sad for her family, and hope they will be comforted when they look back at her scrapbooks.

It blows my mind to think about this. She probably got up this morning and assumed today was like any other day. How could she know that today was to be her last morning on earth? This could be any of us on any given day. Give your family an extra hug and remember to not take any moment for granted.

Wow, has it really been 2 weeks?

I can't believe it's been 2 weeks since I've blogged. Guess I just got caught up in the whole back to school whirlwind. I actually now have two mornings a week where I am ALONE. Can you believe it? It's been 11 years in the making. I still just come home and savor the quiet.

Of course I squeezed some scrap time in since my last post.
Here is a mini I made for MOSD that captured the back to school excitement:








Speaking of Midnight Oil, here is a layout I made featuring Stick Ons. These are SO cool. They are a cross between rub on and stickers. They are vinyl, and add just a bit of dimension to your projects. This page is about Jimmy's preschool road race. The car, the exhaust, and the "o's" in the title are all Stick Ons. I love working with them. Check them out!





Have a great night!