..:: currently ::..

Currently I am...

hearing  my Soul Mate play guitar often, sometimes accompanied by our three year old daughter on her pink guitar. 

loving what I’m hearing. 

feeling overwhelmed at work, happy at home.  I feel like I am at a decision making point with my job.  I'm not sure what will be next for me, or when it will happen, but I know that I am longing for something different.

missing Mikaela

counting my blessings on a daily basis.  Today I am thankful for my mom, my daughters, and my One True Love.  I am lucky to have them in my life.

smelling fall; my favorite season, full of changing leaves, cozy sweaters and football games (and an abundance of orange).  B. and I have had several conversations about the pretty leaves. Sometimes I wish it could always be autumn, but then I remember spring.

enjoying having the windows open so we can feel and hear nature around us.

drinking coffee in the morning and wine in the evening.

cultivating creativity in myself and our daughter.

digging Bob Dylan’s newest record.

hoping to hear him live again soon.

preparing for 31 things in October.  I didn't take the original class, but now I've purchased it as a self-paced class from Big Picture Classes.  I hope to be able to make it happen for myself in October.  I'm thinking a minibook is in order.

obsessing over instagram

anticipating my birthday season

Ali Edwards invited her readers to join her today and publish a post about "right now".  Check out her post here.

~ quick update ~

Just a quick post to show that I am still around!

Last year I tried my first 365 project over on flickr.  If you aren't sure what that is, it is exactly what it sounds like -- 365 days of photos.  One year taking at least a photo a day and posting it to flickr for the group and anyone else to see.  It was right about this time of year last year that I FAILED.    But it wasn't a total fail.  I didn't finish the 365, so in that sense, I failed.  However, I grew as a photographer (eww, I hesitate to call myself a "photographer", it sounds so accomplished or something.  Mostly, I'm a mom who takes photographs). My goals for the 365 was to get better at taking photos (check), take more and better photos to scrapbook (check) and document our lives (check), so in that sense, I didn't fail.

I started another 365 this year, with some of the same lovely virtual friends that I met during my last attempt, and I even added a few more friends along the way.  I started the year off strong, but I haven't been doing so well lately! I'm still going.  I even made it through Mikaela's accident without missing a day.  My photos aren't always so great, and almost always playing catch up with posting them, but I'm still going.  I really want to do this - I want to finish something!

School has started, which means I'm back to work full time, for real, no exceptions, no flexibility, and lots to do. I'm glad for the structure of the day, it helps my mental state.  This is such a busy time!  B (who's 'getting bigger') will turn three on Monday!  I hope to talk about that more in my next post -- but the birthday party, at our house, is this weekend!  Exciting, and busy!

Here are a few photos that have made it into my 365 collection over the last few weeks:

~ summer ~

~ into the sun ~

~ it's a double ~

~ orchid buds ~

~ fun at the fair ~

~ asparagus bruschetta ~

This is one of our favorite meals -- I just had to share it! It's one of my Soul Mate's specialties, but I have learned to help him with it (I can chop)! We make it on a regular basis in the summer, and this time I took a few iPhone photos...so here we go...

olives, tomatoes, cucumbers (and irish cheddar cheese)

fresh garlic and squeezed lime

oregano, thyme, basil, rosemary (all from our garden!)

asparagus, cooked

this time we added two peppers from our garden (we chopped them of course, this was just a photo op)

the final product (served on toasted, wheat french bread with pesto

Not pictured : olive oil!

YUM!  

~ super {hero} fun ~

I'm beginning to dread Mondays!  Even though I am not officially back to work for another few weeks we keep receiving bad news in our family!  Last Monday I received the news that my cousin and her husband lost their daughter in a four-wheeler accident.  It's actually my cousin's stepdaughter, but it doesn't matter.  Just over two years ago this same cousin lost her nineteen (almost twenty) year old daughter in a car accident (leaving a child motherless).  I don't even know Angela, I've never met her, but the news of her death, and my cousin's loss, hit me hard.

This week, I received news that a different cousin's thirty-three year old son had a heart attack and died!  He leaves a wife and four young children.  Their youngest was due only a week apart from me with the baby I miscarried, and was born the morning of Mikaela's visitation!

To all this I say, WHAT IS GOING ON???  (I'm editing my language, of course).  And it all brings back the losses that I've suffered more personally this past year, of course, not that it ever seems to go too far away.

We received the news just before supper, and there were phone calls to make and details to process.  So we just went out to eat.  When we got home, we spent some time outside, which led to impromptu sprinkler fun and a visit from super heroes.  I am so thankful for these times.  I took TONS of photos, pared it down to about 37 for Facebook.  I've done my best to pick only a few for the blog!  I know this story will be documented via scrapbook, I have no idea how I will choose photos!

They aren't sleeping, she is trying to convince him to have a picnic and sleep outside!

I leave you with a B. story:  She was playing by herself for quite a long time, and it was "that time" of day, so...
Me: B, are you pooping?
B: Don't check, OK?

~ makes me smile ~

Everyone says that you should write down the stories, so that later, when you scrap 'em, you remember them.  They also say that to do that you should have places to write it down available at all times.  I found this cute, striped, hard-cover, little notebook, added some washi and text and voila, I now have something to write down the stories that "make me smile".

Soon I will update you all on my park mini book progress.  I've sorta been at a stalemate because I've been trying to make a decision about just how to scrap the last time we took Mikaela to the park with us.  I made some decisions and progress over the last few days and hope to update soon.  I have family coming to town tomorrow and I've really been trying to spend as much quality time with B. as possible, so I've backed off a bit on the blog and the crafty projects!  If you recall, my mini book has mostly pink, green, a hint of blue, and orange (of course), with all orange stitching.  Well, one decision I made was that this page would have purple for Mikaela.  

Here are a few photos of my sweet B. over the last couple of days.  (I LOVE INSTAGRAM, BTW)!

~ in progress ~

I have so many things in progress right now; it's the end of the school year, my graduate class is wrapping up, I've started a few new work projects, I'm continuing with my OLW, and it's spring!  But, the main thing I would like to share today is the progress I've made on the minibook that I am working on.  I am excited about it and learning so much while I do this for the first time!  As mentioned in my last post, I chose a 6x6 format, and I am really happy with that!  Good choice, o.g.! One of the things that I really like about reading other people's blogs is the photographs, so you get photos!  I also like it when people talk about mistakes that they've made along the way -- and how they fix them! So, I will also include some of those.  And finally, I am also going to share the stuff that I learned on this new adventure (I'm certain some of that will overlap with the mistakes)!

The short version:

1.  Made many mistakes, some of which I was able to cover up without much to do, others were a pain in the rear end!

2.  Learned how to stitch in the backy-forthy way, and adjust the tension and length of stitches on my sewing machine.
3.  Decided to use all orange thread with stitching throughout this book; fits with my color scheme, makes me not have to change the thread and bobbin thingy, and it helps that it's my favorite color.
5.  Used mostly Bo Bunny's paper so far -- later you'll see some other patterned papers.

6.  Loving this project.

7.  Doing what I want.

(Keep reading for details and photos - click on any photo to make it bigger)

First of all, I had a difficult time starting this entire mini book because I was trying to figure out how many pages to allow for each outing to the park.  I take way too many photos (and I really stink at making silly, often unimportant in the big scheme of things, decisions)!  I got stressed out enough about it that I even emailed Elise Blaha for advice (I did get many of my "mini" ideas from her BIG mini workshop).  Of course she said exactly what I thought she would say -- it's your book, do what you want!  So I did.

I haven't quite figured out how I'm going to make the cover awesome, so let's start on the inside:

I made the title page first, and then remade it later (one of my learning experiences). First, I printed out the text and punched the right side with this American Crafts Knockout punch.  Then I moved on to the next page because I wasn't sure what I wanted for my title -- but I knew I wanted something along the side! Later,  I settled on "B loves the park" as my title.  I wrote 'B loves' on washi tape (that I purchased at Target and cut in half) used pink (pink for B) alpha stickers (also from Target) for "the park''.   This worked out well because I did make mistakes on this page (described later) -- and fixed the mistakes before I settled on the title text (no wasting the alphas, Yay)!

I discovered if I put the first photo over on the far left of page one and stitched around it, it would be totally cool because it would go around the text on the other side (the title page) perfectly, including the title I eventually put along the side.  So I did that. Enter first oops!  When I stitched the photo onto the page, it looked great -- then I flipped it over.  The stitching on the other side didn't look good at all.  I was right about the placement, but the back side of the stitching itself looked horrible on my title page.  I knew that it was probably something to do with tension or something on my sewing machine, but I know nothing about using the darn thing (proof, and a kinda funny story about that here).  So I started over, new photo, new title page, etc. For the final product, I ended up sewing around the photo before I glued it down.   Then I sewed the title page (also before I glued down the photo on the other side)...so it looks like I might've known what I was doing, but, I didn't.  Before I could do any of that I had to go to my LSS and pick up more paper (because I also printed it wrong several times, used the punch on the wrong side, and other silly, over-forty-brain issues), so I did the right side of the two page spread first, then went back and fixed my boo boo. Don't even get me started on the journaling!  Let's just say, it took several takes.  I ended up using my handwriting, but I tried it many ways!

For page two (close up on the left) I wanted to highlight my daughter and my one true love -- specifically the way they were looking at each other.  So I used the arrows (I like that part).  I just cut them 'free hand' out of some patterned paper.  Also,  I ended up really wanting to put in three swinging photos, and only two really fit, so I hid one! I used my cricut to cut out the text "just love this" (Opposites Attract cartridge).  To protect the hidden photo a bit, I put it in plastic (found some packaging laying around, cut it to size and sewed around it). 

On we go (and yes we are still on the first visit to the park...but I'm doing what I want).

This is actually a two page spread with a little insert (another way to get in a few more photos of this first day of the park season).  The left side is just an instagram iPhone photo printed 6x6 with an added sticker from one of my scrapbook circle kits.  I used a filter on the photo to make it look older (the filter is called 1977 and its included right in instagram).  I liked this photo because my soul mate threw the ball to B, and I took the photo just in time to catch it in the air.  I think it looks like a red balloon.  The right side is just two more photos from the red slide (she loved it that day).  I sewed on a "play" flash card from October Afternoon (Sidewalks) and some small alpha stickers (from another scrapbook circle kit).

The insert is from after the park.  We went to the orange leaf (a chain, frozen yogurt shop that recently opened on our side of town).  The decor at the store is very modern, and quite rad, if I must say so!  The  ice cream is...eh.  But I loved all the orange and green (of course).  They have these cute little orange spoons -- I brought one home thinking I might put it in the book.  I tried, but it was just too bulky for my taste, so I took a photo of it, fussy cut around it and used that instead. The other photos are iPhone photos that my better half took.  I printed them to look like they could be from a photo booth.  I stuck the photo strip and the spoon photo in a piece of plastic that I cut from something (packaging I think?), sewed around it, punched it with myWe R Memory Keepers Crop-o-dile  II, and then inserted it between the two pages.

The very first photo I printed out for this mini book was this one:

And I knew as soon as I saw it that I wanted it for a two page spread.  Initially, I thought I would write all over it; do all of my journaling on this photo, but then I decided on just a quote.  Another uh-oh happened on this one.  When I stitched the "play" card onto the previous page, it looked horrible on this side.  So I covered it with a sticker and added the date!

Finally on to the second visit; a two page spread with a little something in the middle:

For the photos: I took my favorite photo from this day, made it 6x6 for a whole left page.  Next, the right side is just four photos from the day, made square in photoshop, then placed on the page in a grid.  Then I just machine stitched around it (and the backside looks normal - woot).  I think I might put some text in the middle, even if it's just a word, something similar to this.  But I haven't decided yet.  Any ideas?  I am completely serious when I say leave a suggestion in the comments, I'm currently stumped.

The something in the middle is the story! I cut a 12x12 overlay from Hambly Screen Prints into about 6x3 and then stitched it to my story (doubled sided story, printed using the printer).  THE STITCHING WAS NEW!  I didn't know how to stitch in that crooked, backy-forthy way (I'm sure those are the technical words for it).   While I was busy figuring it out, I also figured out how to fix the tension on my sewing machine!! WOOT!  (Lets just not mention that it was right in front of my face the whole time, and not difficult).  This means that I might actually be able to stitch something and use both sides of the stitch the way normal people do it!  Success!  (high five to me!)

I've been taking photos and writing down notes of the other park visits so far this year.  The hardest part is narrowing down the photos!  I think I'm six or seven visits behind.  I'm not sure if I will put every single one in the minibook.  That's what I set out to do, but I may need to back off on that a bit. It's April, and we've been at least eight or nine times!  If I can, I'd like to limit each visit to a two page spread...uhh..but I'm already eight pages in with only two visits documented, yikes!

Whew!  Congratulations to you if you made it through that long post!