It's been a long time. I shouldna left you...

Hey Blog readers! I'm baaaaack! I am so sorry it's been forever. life happened. I have been taking this time out for my fam. We have had a string of sickness in my household and as Mommy you know I am not allowed to get sick. The show must go on... Anyway, we have celebrated alot Christmas, New Years, Spring Break, both my kids birthday's and my own. I finally have a moment to breathe before life speeds up again.

On the Scrapbook front I have been pretty productive. I have hosted a weekend crop in Michigan City, IN and attended a weekend crop with my Scrappy Sister's at Archiver's in Madison,WI. I have also made it a priority to go to Archiver's here in Illinois a few times with my girlfriends who live in the Chicagoland area. Lately I have went to a friends home to scrap and also attend a crop that she hosted benefiting her daughters school. I have also participated in a card swap that I received a dozen very beautiful cards that are so beautiful I don't want to send them out. LOL! The latest thing I have done is enter a mini album swap. It was my first one so of course I was super nervous. I made it out of paperbags and used MME's Miss Caroline paper collection. I sent it off today and am keeping my fingers crossed that the recipient likes it.

Next up for me is to host another weekend crop in Michgan City in June. Then my annual honeycation, our 10th anniversary and Scrapbook expo in August and Scrapfest at Mall of America in MN in September! Hopefully I will write a little bit more before then. I need a nap. God Bless Until my next rant.

Somebody call Hoarders!

So I know that I haven't posted this week like I was supposed to but I have been busy. SORRY! I didn't know what I wanted to talk about anyway. I do now! I got a phone call from a girlfriend the other day who asked me to ship her some clothes that I was holding for her that have gotten to small for my daughter. So I get to this one outfit and noticed that I can't find the jacket to these pants. I thought to myself maybe it is in the garage. I went out into the garage and thought hmm, maybe the next few day would be great to straighten up out there and purge a bit. Then I went to look for the jacket. All I can say is Lord, PLEASE forgive me!

I often think of ways that I can help people in need this time of year. I usually donate food or toys or something of that nature. But when I looked at the massive amount of winter and summer clothes, shoes, hats, pajamas and other things that I have put into my garage over the last three years and all but forgot about them I could just crawl under a rock and die. I feel horrible about the amount of wearable things I have accumulated. So my next few days will be dedicated to giving it all away.

Everyone donates to the Salvation Army and they are a great organization who helps many people but I like to support the places that other people forget about. So I plan to call my local Habitat for Humanity store to schedule a pick up and hopefully my donation will mean that a child won't go without this winter. Pray for me as I take on this daunting task.

Until my next post remember: "He who gives to the poor will never want, but he who shuts his eyes will have many curses." Proverbs 28:27

Not so productive week.

So it's friday!!! And I have not been as productive this week as I would have liked. I have had some issues with my health that have kept me in bed but tomorrow is the last day this week. Sunday is a new week and a new chance to be productive. I am off work pretty much all next week so I challenge myself to be done with 2 Birthday cards, Fall cards and 7 Layouts before I leave town for the weekend.

How is the "shopping freeze" going you might ask? Not well. I have made 2 huge purchases this week. I will let you know next week what they were. LOL! I am also thinking about donating my cricut to my son's school (hint,lol). The only thing is I am not getting rid of any carts with it so I don't know if they have money in the budget to purchase any cartrigdes. I call and talk to his principal and see what she thinks.

*THIS JUST IN* I have 4 weekend crops on the schedule now (not including Scrapfest12). I am not exactly sure how my husband will receive this (super exciting) news. Maybe since they are kinda spaced out he won't say anything. Two of them are in the summer and wont require him to take anytime off of work to be with the children so I am hoping that works to my advantage. We will see...

What are your plans for Thanksgiving? Travel, staying close to home, cooking, shopping, sports?

Until next week... May God bless you and keep you!

Overload.

I have got to kick into scrapbooking overdrive. Since I went to scrapfest I have been on a scrapbook shopping kick. I know what happened. I discovered all these new wonderful companies with great products and I just had to have more... The first one was Bella Blvd. I came home immediately and ordered all that I could find of that companys different collections. This one below is made with Bella Blvd's Family Dynamics collection. I love it because it's a pocket page that I was able to get (9) 4x6 photos on!

The good thing is that I have be so inspired by these lines that I have actually been creating! I got stuff on Overstock, Joanns, a cherry on top, and now Hobby Lobby. Hobby Lobby is the most dangerous of them all because of the instant gratification. I found out that they carry my other new favorite company Echo park. They had the nerve to have all their scrapbooking papers on sale for 50% off. Soooooo dangerous! The LO below is made from EP's Little Boy Collection. I love that collection so much I got 2 of them. It really is great for all of AJ's pictures. I just wish it had a few dinosaurs but that's where Bella Blvd's All Boy collection comes in I guess.

This last LO that I wll share today was made with Lily Bee Designs This and That collection. There are a few more lines that I have ordered Jillibean Soup, My Minds eye and Heidi Swapp that I have yet to use so I am super excited about what's to come.

I think that I should go on a spending freeze and try to use what I have. I have tried to do this more than once and it never seems to work out. I can not refuse a deal. If I see something I like and it's on sale the chances are I am going to get it. Problem is I have so much at this point I sometimes buy things that I already have. Pray for me! Until next week...

The DREAMTEAM

I firmly believe that everything happens for a reason. When I went into labor with Anthony I was 5 and 1/2 months pregnant. It was so early in my pregnancy that they gave me the option to abort him. Of course I never gave it a second thought. I figured that if he was meant to be he would be. And however he turned out I would deal with it accordingly. When I told the doctor that abortion was not an option he told me that there was a 50/50 chance of him living. He also said that if he did live he would probably not thrive and spend a of time in the hospital. I told him that was the chance that I was willing to take. They admitted me to the hospital that same night and he was born almost 2 weeks later. He was 1lb and 13oz and only 14 inches long. Anthony spent the first 4 month of his life in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at the University of Chicago. 90% of that time he attached to a machine that was doing most of his breathing for him. For the first 3 years of his life I took Anthony to an array of specialist and therapist weekly. When he was a year old we moved back to smaller town downstate. My husband could not find a teaching job there and I wondered what was next. We happened to move directly next door to a lady who worked for a school district about 45 minutes away. Long story short she encouraged him to apply and he ended up getting hired. I often wonder why he worked there. After a few years of him commuting and the gas getting close to $5 a gallon I finally talked him into letting us to moving here. I have to admit, I hated it immediately. Anthony started school and I was encouraged because he teacher was great. She really cared about him and his education. Then it came time for Kindergarten. I had the choice of all the schools in the district and though his current school made the top 5 I wanted him to go to an even calender school so that he would not loose so much over the long summers. I picked the school with the balanced calender after meeting their administration and a few of the Kindergarten teachers. I hope that he would get placed into one of their classes and instead he was placed into the classroom of someone I feel should not be teaching at all. After many "incidents" and meetings with the teacher and administrators their I decided that I'd like for him to be moved to another class. I was told that this was not an option. So I asked what I had to do to get him to another school. I was told that he would have to wait until May before he could transfer. It was January. I knew that I would not be comfortable with him being in that classroom all that time so I made the very hard decision to pull him out of school completely. I knew that it wasn't and ideal situation for him socially but at least I would know that he was being treated fairly and that he would be getting the education that he needed. After reaching out to the district I was given permission to move him to either a school that was pretty bad or one that was worse. One was not an option for me and the other was not a great option but had to be better than his current situation. And for the second time in his life I felt like I had let my child down. After stalking the superintendent for almost a week I found out that a seat opened up at his current school. I told them immediately that I wanted it. I had no idea what I was getting him into but again I felt that anything would be better than our current situation. He was placed in Ms. Stewart's class. I was immediately impressed with her. Then I met Ms. B and Ms. M. I thought to myself, these girls reaaaalllly young and I don't know how this is going to workout. But I trusted that God would not have set all of this up and then fail me. After the school year ended I was kind of excited to see what would happen next. The next year would prove a bitter sweet one for us when it was confirmed that he was on the Autistic spectrum (something that I knew a while before but had to convince my husband to have him tested). He was placed in the class of Mrs. F and I was blown away at his progress educational and socially. Though he is repeating 1st grade I know that it was the best decision we could have made for him. It kinda gave him time to catch up to himself. I am continually amazed by the knowledge and growth of Anthony on a daily basis and I have the "DREAMTEAM" to thank for this. My son is one of my most prized possessions and I trust them with him daily and they have not let me down at all. I know first hand that good teachers don't hear it often enough but what they do makes a huge difference. His teachers are the best of the best. They are all people who I will never ever forget nor will I let Anthony forget. Words can not express my gratitude and there is no amount of money that I could pay them for the gift that they give him each day. I still REALLY hate the town I live in but as long as they are at his school this is where we will be. So a million and one THANK YOU to everyone who works together and has a hand in helping my Miracle boy reach his goals. And if no other parent ever tells you how they feel keep this forever. Be encourage and keep doing what you're doing.

Winter Weekend Crop

I have been so blessed this year to become a part of 2 different scrapbook groups. In fact I consider myself to be a founding member of both. First is my Sisterfriends Group. This group is made of some very old friends and a couple very new friends. We went on a weekend retreat to a beach house in Michigan City, IN. The house was something you would see in a movie. The grounds were sooo peaceful and relaxing. And the weekend itself was in a word magical. There were 8 women in the house and eveyone got along soooo nicely. I was not exactly suprised given the group I choose to invite. But this began the 1st of many annual retreats for us. I can not wait until June to get these girl back together. It was a great time indeed. I value the relationships I have with them all and love that the hobby that unites us all more that anyone could imagine.

Then after attending Scrapfest 2011 in MN and meeting some more of my amazing scrapbooking sisters I returned and joined Scrappy Girls. This group of ladies branched off from a Facebook group of ladies who attended Scrapfest. I could not be more happy to connect with so many women from the midwest. There are many scrapbooking groups out there but you always feel like you are on the outside looking in when you join. It'a completely different with these ladies because we all started the group together I feel a certain sense of inclusion. We have started a birthday club and plan on doing swaps and crops together. In fact the first one is coming up in December. Back to Michigan City we go and I for one can not wait!!!!

Finally getting my scraproom back.

The crown moulding is finally going in! This has been such a long process. I have wanted my room completed since we moved here. After all these years I finally got the project approved in the summer. They told me it would be a fall project so I have patiently waited. I gave them until October 15th and here we are in the final hour trying to finish up. They had me move everything out of my room almost 3 weeks ago. I had to cram everything in the restroom a short hall and my bedroom. I have had to climb over Jetmax cubes to get into bed for the last 19 days. After a 7 day delay in getting started, 1 day of drywalling, 5 days of mudding 1 day of priming, 3 days of nothing, 1 day of painting and a day of trim and carpet I will get my home back...

I am so super excited to put my room back together. I will post before and after pics before the weekend is over....