Woohoo!

Two great things to report today!

1) The girls have plans of going to Sunday School with their Aunt and Uncle again today. And since Dave's working AGAIN (poor guy), I get some "me" time. Guess what I'll be doing? Scrapping of course. :P I have a circle journal to get ready to go in the mail by tomorrow (I think that's the mail out date).

2) 123-Scrap is FINALLY back up and running. Just the forums for now (we're told by Pam), but that's awsome news. Pam worked so hard the past couple days to recover what the hackers devoured and I so appreciate all the hard sweat and tears. We have our little home back. You know you're addicted to a site when you are able to chat (ie: sitting in front of the computer just raring to post), but can't and you miss your online friends like crazy.


~lets see if blogger lets me post this without triple posting it~

Darn Blogger

How that last post got on here three times is beyond me. Thanks Chris for pointing that out. :)

Do you remember the TV show The Littlest Hobo? I was flipping through chanels upon waking this morning .. looking for something to watch while drinking my cup of java, when I stumbled upon this show. I remember watching it when I was in my young teens. It was one of the shows we were actually aloud to watch, according to my parents. Anyway .. it was a nice blow to the past for a half hour.

Today it's raining. :( I had hoped we'd have a nice day so I could scoot the girls outside to play for awhile and I could then pine away at my scrapbooking desk .. creating. Well, we'll see how things go and how well the girls will play together today and I may just get my wish.

I'm so missing my regular hangout at 123-scrap.com. Some stupid hackers decided to play havoc with our sweet scrapbooking site and messed things up something fierce. Pam's working oh so hard, trying to upgrade and recover things but we're on day three of being down. I find myself at a loss when I don't have that site to visit during my computer time. On the upside .. the house is in good shape and I do have more time to spend scrapping when the girls aren't in need of me.

So on that note .. have a wonderful Saturday!

"for you Mommy....

because I love you." Awww!
Hailey interupted her outside play, just to bring me a bouquet of these flowers, then back outside she ran again.
It's gestures like that, especially after her horrid behaviour on the walk home from school, that make being her Mom oh so worth it. :)

priceless gems

Today's a day for a few mismatched topics.
I had to record this little "gem" from Alissa so I can scrap it at a later day and not forget it.

I took her into the public bathroom at Hailey's school as we were there picking H up, and she goes into the stall and locks it (a new 'grown up' thing to do now). I stood by the sink waiting for her (okay, and listening .. lol). I hear her tinkle, and then she quite proudly says "I just laid a pee." I burst out laughing and then she asks me what I'm laughing at. I asked her what she meant by just laying a pee and she says "you know, like when you lay an egg, but pee came out instead." Where on earth does she get this stuff? *rolls eyes*

Hailey's class had a special farm themed performance today. She had to go to school dressed looking all farmish/cowgirlish. Her class performed in front of the rest of the school in an assembly, and although I was a tad late, I still got some pictures. Every pic I took sucked big time because I was standing in the back by the door, and zooming in anywhere between 16-32 x makes for very blurry images. I think I can work with them tho, by turning them into sepia or b&w and just going with it.


I've been researching something I'd like to do once Alissa's in Kindergarten in September. It's been over a year now that I've been looking forward to taking a specific online course and this in turn making it possible for me to either work from home or from an office setting. And with Alissa attending 1/2 days of Kindergarten, I can then dedicate that time to my schooling which will take 9-12 months to complete. Then when she is into grade 1 and Hailey in grade 3 (both full days), I can work the 6 hrs (less the time to walk them to and from school I suppose) from home. This allows me to continue being the stay at home Mom I've always wanted to be, as well as contributing to the household in the form of cold hard cash. I've been out of the work force for 8 years already, and I'd have to upgrade something serious in order to hold down any previous positions I used to have even, but this schooling may give me the best of both worlds. This helps me get through the blues of sending my baby to Kindergarten. I mean, my gosh .. my baby is almost 5!!!

cloudy and cold

What??? Where'd our sun go? It's cloudy and a chilly 12 degrees. I believe the thermometer is lieing because it feels MUCH colder then 12 c. That doesn't mean the girls aren't outside in their shirt sleeves, playing hard as usual. Me? I'm penned up indoors acting like a whimp and complaining about having to have the door open so I can hear the girls play.

I'm bagged, and totally pooped. Weds and Thurs mornings I do childminding for some gov't funded groups for Moms and babies. There's a couple of us gals that do the childminding, but Weds always are the worst. There's this one little boy that is such a handful that he makes most of the kids the Super Nanny works with look like angels. I swear, she'd eat him up and spit him out in an instant, and yet it seems his mother doesn't see what her child is doing. He's in all the other kids faces, stealing toys, causing ruckus beyond anyone's control. He tires me out! I used to think running after two toddlers of my own was tough work, this little guy is about four of my girls put together. So after three hours of watching him and 12-14 other ones ranging in ages from 8mos to 6yrs old .. I'm pooped.

I'm just looking forward to my evening of reality TV tonight. The AI results show, LOST and Amazing Race.

Do I have to?

It's been another gorgy day. Not as hot as yesterday (only 16 degrees), but still so nice. Tuesdays are my mornings alone, but Dave came home early to pick something up and asked if I wanted to go with him to the tire shop to have a sound that just arose after yesterday's pricey visit, so off I went with him.
However, I did manage to get a couple layouts done in and around picking up kids from school, etc. You can see them here.

So what I don't want to do is drag the girls in for bathtime. They're playing oh so nicely outside with our new neighbour's boys. The boys are the same ages as the girls, but you'd think they were much younger if you took their size into consideration. Funny how girls grow faster at first, then the boys catch up a little later. But then you have my two giant girls, who tower over even other girls of the same age. That's what they get for having a daddy who's 6'3" and a mama that's average at 5'8". Hmm .. maybe that explains my constantly empty fridge and cupboards. I'm feeding giants!

Well .. I've prolonged it long enough. Time for a bath.

Feeling hot, hOt, HOT!

Yes, that's right .. it's a toasty 22 degrees celcius here at the moment and I took FULL advantage of a lovely day. I cleaned up the backyard (if you can even call the tiny piece of fenced in property that) and finally threw away an overly loved tricycle and an old scooter that no longer took a straight path. We have huge trees in the back that shed their pine needles throughout the entire winter and under them is our cement patio. I took the broom to that, and swept up what seemed like pounds of needles. If I could sell them, I'd be one rich mama. :P
Then if that wasn't enough, I headed around front to play in the two front flower beds. The weeds had grown up alongside the little shrubs on the one side, but thankfully only some needed some extra tugging and the rest came out quite easily. On the other side I have a vine I planted two years ago that has run the length of the bed and has filled it in quite nicely, but I'm thinking I'd like some colour in there too. I know it's to late to plant bulbs or seeds, but maybe some other pretty flower would work. Maybe I'll find a nice wild flower already in small plant form.

So, I do have a little complaining to do. Actually I have alot of complaining to do. Firstly let me express my utter dismay and outrage with blogspot. Why on earth do they decide to do a scheduled maintenance at 4pm PST? AND, just when I had a nice long post typed up, with pictures to yet. ugh. ugh. ugh. So I'll need a little excusion if I don't make any sense, because after all, in my own head .. I've typed this all up already and it made sense at one time.

For the rest of my complaint. Why is it that tires blow when you're SOOOO not prepared financially for the outcome? You probably guessed it. Yes we blew a tire. Thankfully it wasn't at any high speed, and it was on a back road with no other traffic, but still! So, this morning we went to check out tires. Thanks to knowing a tire shop through my BIL, we managed to find a really good deal, with a few other perks that will come in handy a few kilometers into our future.

I'm playing with angles on my camera, and love capturing different moods without the subject knowing they're being filmed. I'm sure you can imagine who my two main subjects are, and yesterday I focused more on my little missy. Here's a few. Oh and I must say .. that same little missy is becoming quite a budding photographer too. :)










...and then one she took.
It's interesting to see the world through the eyes of a child.

Icky

Ordinarily I'd be thrilled to pieces to be left alone for a few hours. That's the scenario today. Dh is off working just down the street (so he could leave me the car), and the girls went with their Aunt and Uncle and I'm left home to do whatever I darn well please. Only thing is .. I'm feeling miserable. Crampy and icky and just not feeling much like doing anything. The cupboards and fridge are screaming for me to fill them, and that'll have to be done today whether I like it or not, but until I feel the urgency to do so, I'm just going to go lay on the couch and soak up the possibility to do so, as well as the quietness. Ahhhh!

some scrapping

I did manage to plant myself at my scrapping desk today and made four thank you cards and a couple layouts for my "View from Vancouver Island" album. You can see them here.

Yum!

The sun is oh so warm and toasty today and I hope the temperature will rise in degrees to match how wonderful the sun feels.

Hailey has gone to her best friend's birthday party at a local indoor wall climbing place. She's not much of an athlete, but I'm sure she'll burn off enough energy to be good and tired tonight.
Alissa and I were going to take the city transit bus for a little adventure, but as anyone knows that has ever taken the public bus, it takes forever to get anywhere and the two hours that Hailey will be gone would not have been enough time .. so little missy is still in her jammies and apparently proclaiming she won't be getting dressed anytime soon. Suits me just fine, cuz I'll go scrap. :P

So that sums up my Saturday.

Woohoo

I got them! I just purchased the tickets to So You Wanna Fight. I'm giving them to Dave for his birthday which is just a few days before the event. I have a babysitter lined up for that night already too. This is something Dave's been wanting to go to for a few years after he went 3 yrs ago, and even mentioned it again not long ago. Oh he's going to be so excited!

I just have to add a second little post while I wait for the floor to dry so I can continue on my list of chores. The sun is shining oh so brightly and the air is cool and 'springy'. I just love this kind of weather!

I recieved a beautiful bouquet of flowers from my sweet little Alissa as we walked Hailey to school. There's an empty lot we pass by and there's wild flowers growing without a care in the world. I don't know what they're called, but I prefer these to the ordinary bouquet of dandilions. ;)

Friday, I'm so happy to see you!

Normally I love Fridays because it means it's the last day before the weekend, and that means FAMILY TIME! But Dave's working this weekend, so it has a different meaning this week.
It's the first day, since being back from our little trip, that I can just be home .. catch up on the cleaning I wasn't able to squeeze into the other two days .. and hopefully scrap. I have some thank you cards to make, not to mention my 'project a day' challenge to keep plugging along on.

A gal on one of my scrapbooking sites put out a challenge. She asked those of us that want to participate, to dig deep into our stash and find paper that we had bought way back when. You know, the paper I now think is UGLY but haven't tossed or passed on to Hailey yet. The paper I just HAD to have when I first started scrapbooking. Yep, that paper. And try to implement it into a current layout in my current style. Oy, what a challenge that will be, but one I definetly want to try. So, I shall try to make that my mission today. Scrap the ugly paper in a fashionable way.

Oy, the rain!

I've seen enough rain over the winter, to last me a lifetime .. yet it still keeps coming. Today's a rainy day, so not even a chance to play at the playground on our way home from school. But, I'll look at the positive. At least the rain makes my surroundings lush and green and after being up north over the weekend and seeing the vast amounts of brown, I. am. thankful.

Hailey's last day of swimming lessons through the school was today. She passed! So on to level 5 she goes. She's going to be quite the little swimmer, me thinks.

I'm finally getting to the bottom of the laundry accumulated over the past week. Now that THAT is under control (if you're the one that does the laundry in your household, you know what I mean about controling the laundry beast), I can work on racking the three batches of wine we have on the go. Off to sanitize the equipment I go.

Good to be HOME!

I simply LOVE going away, visiting, relaxing and all the rest that comes with going on a mini vacation, but DAMN it's good to be home again!
There's nothing like your own cozy bed to snuggle in after sleeping on a pull out sofa bed. And that's all I have to say about that! lol

We had a fabulous time with family. The drive was only bearable thanks to a certain portable DVD player, colouring goodies, books and of course Bratz and stuffies.
I had such a wonderful visit with my parents, and it was so good to see my Dad after him having gone through heart surgery in December. He's looking so healthy now, now lets hope his memory can catch back up to his newly improved heart.
The girls adored every moment with each grandparent and just ate up all the spoiling, hugs and love. We had fun going down memory lane as we cruised through my hometown since not being back in 4 years for me and 8 yrs for Dave. Our first apartment together, the lake we met at, the look out point we'd frequent *giggles*. Yep, twas a good time alright.

Hailey and Alissa sitting on Grandma and Grandpa North's laps

These four photos were taken out at the look out over the Peace River.
(l to r: Dave, Hailey and Grammy, Alissa, Me)

Some more random photos from our holiday found here.

Bye!

Well .. tonight's the FINAL night before we head up to the great North! We need to be up and at 'em by 3:30am so we can leave the house by 4:30am to catch the 5:15am Ferry off the Island. Good thing I'm a morning person, eh? As for the rest of my family .. I guess the pillows and blankies will come in handy.

So, Happy Easter .. and all that jazz. See you around the middle of next week!

2 more sleeps!

Oh my! It's getting more and more exciting around here. I did the girls laundry yesterday so I can start putting clothes we're taking, into piles to later pack. I may have to do a last minute wash along with our laundry tomorrow. But I'm making "to take" piles, and finishing up some of the gift projects, etc. Last night I made up some Easter cards to take for the all the parents (saves me on postage this year). Did I mention we're seeing ALL our parents? Dave's Mom only lives 4 hours east of my parents and she's coming and staying the weekend too, and we'll see Dave's Dad and Step-Mom on the way back home again. Yipee!

So after dropping both girls off at their schools, I walked up to the local pharmacy/store to pick up a new hair dye (yes, this gal has to dye her hair monthly .. did I blow that perfect image of myself you had? ;)) and a couple other toiletries needed for the trip. I have been avoiding all Easter aisles in any store I enter. Reason? Because I do NOT need chocolate in this house! But, since we'll be away and won't be able to do an egg hunt with the girls, I figured I better at least have some chocolate for them to open and eat Sunday morning. They'll get spoiled by grandparents too, so I kept it only to a chocolate bunny each and a bag of Hugs Hershey Kisses to divvy up. I've stashed them in the suitcase already, so out of sight out of mind.

I've done SO well for the past two days. This is my third day of eating cheat free. Actually, I accidentally sipped on Alissa's strawberry milkshake yesterday before I realized what I was doing. Hopefully that won't affect my efforts to get this body into carb burning mode.

I've been doing some updates on my "project a day" blog. It's not going as planned, but every finished project is a finished project. And THAT makes me happy! :)

Tagged!

Pam has tagged me! The idea behind this tag is that you choose someone your admire or respect and highlight them.
As I'm not sure whether this admiration needs to be within the scrapbooking community or not .. I'll just stick to it just in case.

I met Cori on a Canadian swapping yahoo group and happened to be in a couple swaps with her over time. Shortly after 'meeting' her, I posted an invitation on the board to another board that friends and I were starting up (the birth of 123-Scrap!). She accepted the invitation by joining, and between this and another smaller BC group, I really got to know Cori. I watched her style change and develop into something that became HER style. I watched through her photos and layouts, her children grow over a few years time, and through chatting back and forth on the different boards, I got to know her. I missed a couple chances to meet her and other common friends at two different scrapping retreats, and I swear I'll be going to the next one FOR SURE!
Anyway, I admire Cori not only for her amazing talent and way that she gets her story across in scrapping, how also she hasn't let the fad sweep her up, but she stays true to her style. Also how sweet a person she is, who I hope to one day meet in real life.

3 more sleeps!

You can not even imagine my utter excitement and anticipation about seeing my family. We NEVER go 'home' because it always works out that most of our families come down this way instead. Who can blame them, it's tropical here compared to the brown, ugliness of the north .. so if I have to add up the years since I've been back, it's been 4. Dave hasn't been back for 8!
I flew back with the girls when Alissa was only 10 mos and Hailey not even 3 yet. Of course we've seen most my siblings last year, and the year before that was our family reunion so everyone was in attendance for that .. being it was my parent's 50th Anniversary year.

Anyway .. I'm so excited, and I'm having fun collecting things to pack, making a list of things that I can't pack but need to remember to bring (car entertainment included), and also doing my usual Monday morning cleaning/laundry. MUST leave this place in an orderly fashion too because I remember how much I despise arriving home to a mess (mad dash exit) to clean up on top of unpacking.

When feeling shitty .. go shopping! That's my motto. :)

I've always wanted a pair of those weird looking shoes everyone's wearing these days. They looked hideous but how could you not like a shoe named "crocs" and that came in every colour there ever was? After hitting a shoe store, trying them on and feeling the heavenly soft cushion between my foot and the floor, I couldn't resist anymore. But you see, I'm also a practical kinda gal and started thinking how many outfits I'd have to match to a certain colour. Hence, I picked black. That way I can wear them ALL summer if I want, and they'll match anything. Okay, maybe they won't look so hot with shorts or capris, and I'll have to stick to wearing them with just jeans, but you get the picture I'm trying to paint, right?
My friend Pam has got THE cutest pair of hot pink ones. Don't you want to wear them forever after having tried them now, Pam?

The girls went with Auntie S to Sunday School and then later, lunch and the rest of the afternoon. That gave Dave and I time to get groceries and some other shopping done too. I had to purchase ribbon for a swap I'm hostessing through a Canadian Swap board, so we hit Michaels. Then later Dave had hockey practice, so I'm sitting waiting for him to come out, and I took that pic of my crocs. Hee!

Well that's all folks. It has been a great day. I shopped, I proudly sat through a hockey practice, had a day without kids, AND stuck to my diet. However, I didn't exercise, but not for lack of trying. Tomorrow I will. I WILL!

Major Vent

Feel free to skip this post, as it's pretty much here only because I need to type this out because I'm so very frustrated.

So now that I've given that disclaimer, you can't blame me for a totally boring, selfish post.
This morning I pulled out the dress I was thinking about wearing to my nephew's wedding next weekend when we're visiting up north. I wore it only once, to my one of my other nephew's wedding last year, but I think a year between wearings should be okay, plus there will be other people attending, etc. Anyway, once I got past the whole 'is it appropriate to wear it to two family weddings?', I decided to try it on before throwing it into the laundry for a fresh wash. Boohoohoo .. it was to tight over the thighs. :( :( This is THE first place I lose AND gain weight, and after falling off Dr Atkins diet last fall, I thought by watching what I ate and exercising would keep me fairly stable. Yes I've gained about 10lbs back since then, but I didn't realize it was that noticeable .. at least in my jeans it wasn't. I'm so sad that I have to lose all that ALL over again, AND I can't wear that particular dress next weekend to the wedding. So guess what I immediatly did after trying that dress on? Kicked it into high gear and did me a work out dvd. I need to grocery shop this weekend too, so you know I'll be skipping the cookie/cracker aisles FOR sure this time. Even the girls don't need this junk.

Boohoohoo. I really wish I had someone that could take the 'wrong' food from my hand whenever I made a wrong choice. I know for me it's all about counting carbs. That's the only thing I've had success with, so even though good fibers such as health food granola sounds healthy .. for me it's just not what takes the weight off.

Okay .. that's the end of my vent post. If you read this, you're a true, sweet, caring friend.

so neglectful

I'm such a bad parent .. my poor baby blog has suffered this week and I do apologize.

I'm SOOOO loving my new car. I love driving it with all it's pep and comfort. It was like going from a tin can to a cadillac (well my version of one anyway ;)). So comfy and I know we're going to really enjoy our 1200+ km trip to see my family in northern BC.

In other news .. the weather's been gorgy and I pulled out my sandals again yesterday. Once I get used to the cooler feet, I'm gung ho with sandals and will wear them right to the bitter end come fall. But it's just that seasoning of the feet .. or toughening up of the winter woosies, if you will. hah! My senses are taking in so much right now. The birds chirping, the sky lightening and willing the sun to burst over the horizon, the warm morning air and if I step outside I know I'd smell the fresh earthy smell of a blossoming earth. Yes .. THIS is my favourite season (for now ;)).

The girls are over the sickies and the bonus is that Dave and I didn't get the stomach flu they had. Yay! Don't get me wrong. I'd be sick for them in a heartbeat, but to have to deal with them being sick and up all night, to having it after them myself .. ugh. Not something I can handle although many atime I have.
So it's upward and onward and lets just leave the winter sickies behind!
Hailey has her 3rd of 5 swimming lessons today. Her school class is doing this, so it's a shortened version of a regular lesson level (I think they usually run for 6 or 8 weeks), but she'll have earned her 4th level badge when she's done. We took the girls swimming over the weekend and Hailey was showing up all the new things she's learned which pretty much boiled down to some terrific 'starfish' floats. I'm really proud she has no fear of the water, and is learning to appreciate the art of swimming. It takes awhile and if she's eager to, we'll put her through all the lessons she wants, but for living on an Island where we're surrounded by water and such wonderful sealife to see, I hope she takes advantage of learning and then in turn can really appreciate her surroundings.
This actually goes for both girls .. but Alissa's obviously at a younger/lower level in her lessons.

Well that's it for my boring entry. Enjoy your day!

Yay, a new car!

We've been driving a piece of crap '88 Hyundai for the past five months since our Jeep had to be taken off the road for some minor (but dh is NOT a mechanic so minor still takes MONTHS to fix) repairs and at one point we were hoping to sink some cash into a brand new vehicle. Even test drove a gorgeous Toyota Yaris, but alas .. they couldn't bring the payments down to what we could comfortably afford on our one income, so instead we took our saved "down payment" and bought a new (to us) car out right. Some may dis it and turn their head .. but I'm tickled pink about this baby. It has all the bells and whistles, including cruise control! Woohoo!

In behind the car is our poor Jeep who needs some tender loving care. Kinda ironic we ended up with another white vehicle. LOL

one more hour

So another DayLight Savings under the belt. Ahhh it will be so nice to have that extra hour of light at the end of the day again.

So we usually wait until the next morning (today) to change clocks since we never have anywhere to be on Sundays. But our bedroom alarm clock/radio has daylight savings built into it and changes on it's own. I keep forgetting this and I woke up this morning thinking .. wow .. I slept in for a change! I fight that inner alarm clock and even on weekends find it hard to sleep past 6 or 6:30 when that's when I'm used to waking up during the week. This morning the clock read 7:17! I must have been tired? Nope .. until I came downstairs and glanced at the livingroom clock did I remember the cool setting the bedroom clock has.

April Challenge!

My friend Lisa participated in a 'layout a day' challenge for the month of March, and I so like the idea that I'm going to try it for myself. Now I can't forecast that I'll have time each and every day to scrap, but I'm going to make 30 projects (layout, card, something altered) for April whether it's daily or 7 all in one weekend, etc.
So please wish me luck .. because as much as I adore and am slightly addicted to scrapbooking, I have dry spells too. 30 days of free flowing inspiration could be asking alot, but I'm up for the challenge.
Any other scrappers want to join me? *insert begging smilie*

In my sidebar, you'll find a link to where I'll keep my uploaded work, called A Project a Day.