We're Going to have a Wedding!

Very excited happening in our family right now. On Valentine's Day, Josh proposed to Chrissie, my daughter.  I am so happy for her and the boys and I know they will make one happy family!  They are getting married on July 13, 2013.  This date has special meaning because it is my mom's birthday and my brother Will and his wife Odie's anniversary.

We have been dress shopping off the mountain one day a couple weeks ago and we are going the other way off the mountain tomorrow.  Grandma, Aunt Karin, and bridesmaid Becca are going with Chrissie and I.  These are the first two she tried.  She likes the black but not it being strapless, loves the way the white one fits her.  Think we'll definitely look for the top to be a halter style.

The other exciting part is that this will be an outdoor wedding and me and my craft buddies will be making most all the decor, program, invites etc.   Until she picks her colors I have to hold off a bit but we have plenty of time since the wedding is 16 months away.  (Yea, remind me I said that later on, will you?)  They want more of a rustic theme; summery, barn, fields of green, sunshine, lemonade etc. Any ideas will be helpful so please comment.  Thank goodness for Pinterest because I've already gotten a good start.  I think if I can design it ok, that the program will go on a fan.  They are thinking of using the Doc & Merle Watson Theater on the campus of Wilkes Community College for the venue. It is an open but covered stage, huge, with three separate areas. One does have ceiling fans but we will look into renting cooling units.  July in Wilkesboro will be HOT.  It has dressing rooms and a prep kitchen area. Plenty of parking, big field in front of the venue in case we decide to do it outside.  Also a playground for the kids if they get bored!  You can't ask for more for an outdoorsy rustic theme!  We aren't done looking yet because I'd love to find a big barn in Ashe County where we live.  It is usually a good 12-15 degrees cooler than Wilkes in the summer.

I gave Chrissie a Smash so that she can get started on creating one for her wedding.  And I'm going to ask my friend Marie to do the pictures for us. She works wonders with a camera and I can't wait to see the end result!  This is all that is decided upon right now.  If you have any ideas, please send them my way.  This is a project that will involve all the help I can get!

SMASH

SMASH!

I absolutely love this idea from Michael's and have already started using them.  I found it on Pinterest!  If you haven't Pinterested, you better get started. What fun!  The Smash books comes in pink, green, yellow, black, red, blue and orange. Lot's of accessories can be purchased for pretty cheap...pockets, paper & fabric tabs, stickies, marks, captions retro & flag clips, date stamp with different sayings and big rubber bands to put around the book.  You can also use any other scrapbooking or cardmaking supplies.  The sky is the limit, just use your imagination. 

I bought the first one for a friend at work, Kimberly, who is getting married.  Smash allows her to keep all her wedding planning together in one book but with a little bit more pizzazz than a memo pad or calendar planner. The pen and glue is attached right to the book and each page has different colors and themes.  She is able to keep all her thoughts about colors, dresses, flowers and anything else wedding in this book and will have something great to look back on.  She is very creative so I can't wait to see it when it's done.  She doesn't have to stop there, if you fill one book up, start another.  

I have started and will finish my first book today.  Another friend at work has a beautiful 18 month old daughter, Adair.  I love this little girl and have declared myself her office Grandma!  I am putting in pictures and notes for Lindsay to be able to jot down things about the memory on that particular page.  This is a nice book to save for Adair to see when she is older.  I am also doing one for Lindsay's mom, Carol. 

Another friend, Kim, has bought one for her daughter for Valentine's Day.  Caitlin recently graduated from  Appalachian with a fashion design degree.  She can use this as an idea book for her creations.  I can see this Smash being filled with fabric swatches and drawings of fashion ideas!

My grand-nephew is getting into an age where he wants to journal his thoughts.  For a seven year old boy that is just wild!  He loves to draw, to write, to scribble!  He loves sneaking up to my craft room to use all the goodies up there too.  I have not bought him one yet, but he is next on my list.

A traditional scrapbook takes time.  If you want to speed things up, this is the way to do it.  So whether you are planning a wedding, having a baby, starting your career, teacher, student - you name it, it can be applied! Go out and SMASH today!

I am a scrapbooker, not a collector of scrapbook supplies!

I saw this on Pinterest somewhere and I thought, that is me.  I have all the supplies you can imagine in my craft room.  I have every new machine that has come out.  My husband, my Mom, my kids and even co-workers give me gift certificates to Michael's on occasions so they are feeding my habit!  The store here is only a year or so old so.  We had nothing but a Walmart before that. I would drive down to Winston-Salem, hour and half from my house, and go to AC Moore's and Michael's.  Then I discovered a Hobby Lobby...OH MY!  But most of my paper and embellishments came from Club Scrap.  I would get a pizza box monthly filled with all kinds of wonderful things to create scrapbooks or cards.  I did this for years and most of them I haven't even opened yet.  They just kept coming, we were in the middle of moving, and I just kept packing them away.  Then at the new house when I finally got my craft room done and I unpacked everything, I was amazed at what I had accumulated.  But it also showed me all the things I said I was going to do and then never did. I would see a project, go buy the supplies and then find the bag weeks later with everything still in it and no project done.
Even in my craft room, there are so many things that I don't have enough storage for it all.  And let me tell you, crafters would die for my room.  It is about 20x16, desk, tables, some storage units, though more is needed.  All my pizza boxes are stacked up in a corner, over 50 of them, not opened.  If I don't see it, I don't use it. I have gotten as far as using boxes I bought at Michael's and Walmart to put supplies in; glues, tapes, dot adhesives, brads, scissors, markers, paints, pencils, etc.  And yes, I have enough to fill at least one shoebox size sometimes more than one box of each different supply. Those are all marked and stacked against the wall.  I have a large cart with plastic drawers that I have all my different stickers in, separated by category; letters, wedding, baby, family, Christmas and other. I have so many stamps that I have stacked in boxes and some not even taken out of the boxes.  The pizza boxes all have at least one stamp in it.
My excuses.  Don't want to turn the heat on upstairs in the winter.  Hate to bring it all out to the dinner table only to have to put it away again even if I'm not done.  Have to babysit on one of my two days off with my 4 and 5 year old grandsons, and sometimes my little Aden, 10 months old. Husband misses me working all week and wants me to watch football with him (even though he is in the chair snoring).  Only the weekend to clean house and that is only sometimes since at times I work on Saturday.  See, lot's of excuses not to do something for me.  I guess I sound like I'm complaining. I am a very lucky person and never want to take things for granted. 
This winter, they are going to finish the upstairs. The plasterer will be in to do the other bedroom and the foyer area. I will move the bed out of my craft room into the bedroom.  I will organize the room so that I can see what I have.  I have about 4 tables to do my projects on and I will start/continue doing my projects.  I AM A SCRAPBOOKER, NOT A COLLECTOR OF SCRAPBOOK SUPPLIES!

Eventually, I will get on this blog more often. Still getting my Mom settled with the financial end of things.  She is living with my sister now as she wants to sell her house. My sister, Karin, is a saint.  She should have been a nurse because she is such a caring person. You would love her if you met her.

This weekend was a rainy, cold weekend.  I stayed in all day Saturday and most of the day Sunday.  Mom and I road over to her house to check on it and get the mail, and then a quick trip to the grocery store.  Mom stayed and watched football and basketball with Gary.  So I had almost two full days to scrap or make cards and I didn't feel like doing either.  Don't know why. I even went to Michael's on Friday to get a few things with the gift cards I had gotten for Christmas. I have so many projects either on paper or in my head, but I can't get started.  Maybe I will reorganize myself and put the projects in a list of priorities. That is how I handle things at work so maybe it will get me started at home too.  I don't need anymore inspiration because that will just add to my already long list! I think I will talk to Karin, that will help.  She will get me on the track to creativity again.  I hope. 

I am participating in a semester long class for work. Supervisor Development Series.  I've had fun so far and have enjoyed doing the extra work. I hope this will help me get the raise that I (and so many others) deserve.  It's tough in these economic times to be working for the government. 

I know this piece has been kind of wish-washy, back and forth.  It's another rainy cold day.  No sunshine in 3 or 4 days.  I think maybe it plays on my mind.  MAYBE I'm allergic to cloudy, rainy days.  It could be why I'm feeling this way! 

Twinkle twinkle little star

This is one of the best things that we saw on the trip to Australia (Aug. 2011).  The Southern Cross.  You will never see this unless you go to the Southern Hemisphere.  We were out in the Outback at a dinner party in an open tent under the most beautiful star lit night in Australia. An astronomer took us out away from the tent to see the skies and tell us about the night sky.  We were so far out  in the wilderness with the only light for miles coming from the tent and because of this you could see zillions of stars!  Definitely one of those WOW moments!

Australian Sunsets

Beautiful sunsets of the outback of Australia.

Long Time No Post

This has been a long year ending in sadness.  So many things have changed since my last post.  I hope this is the start of blogging every day or so AND I might even let people read it!  I really want to start posting some of my papercrafting and other projects.  I also love photography and want to post some of my photos here. I went on a great trip to Australia, New Zealand and Fiji and have a lot to chose from!

The sadness came on Christmas day.  We had our normal tradition of the kids families and my Mom and Dad over in the morning to open their presents.  We all had fun going through our gifts, putting the batteries in the kids gifts and checking over what everyone else got.  While making breakfast, my Dad suffered a stroke.  The ambulance got him to the ER and there suffered 6 more strokes. He lived until December 29th (my husband's birthday). Christmas was my Dad's favorite holiday and he made us love it as well.  It will be hard next Christmas, but I think he would want us to continue as we normally would; with tradition, spirit, fun and with all his love.