TGIF

I can't believe it's been 2 weeks since I blogged! I was so good and writing every day for a good while. Time really does just escape these days. My girls are doing great. Halloween is this weekend, and they will transform into the cutest little ladybugs, complete with wings. I hope they like them, because the wings make their outfits -- otherwise, it's just red shirts, black pants, and freckles added. We'll see and hope. They will have fun regardless.

The husband and I have discovered something fun and so simple to spend a little time together and relax some. Twice this week, we played Scrabble before bedtime. It was such fun! Santa gave us this Scrabble game last Christmas, and we didn't even open it until this week. Did you know the new games don't come with wooden tiles? They are plastic, made to look like the old wooden ones. We'll be on the lookout for a garage sale set in the future, just for the nostalgia of it. We haven't taken score, but we will next time maybe. Need to start a little earlier to get in a good, competitive game. I've got Yahtzee on my mind as well. I love Yahtzee.

Once again,

time flies. The weeks sure do seem to pass quickly this time of year, Maybe all times of year. I love the season though. As previously mentioned, fall is a fabulous time, quickly followed, heck, overtaken by THE holiday season -- Christmas. My projects for ebay have already turned to Christmas ones, and I'm having a Christmas Card workshop for Stampin' Up! in a few weeks. I haven't even begun to think about my personal projects for Christmas, and I need to. I really do like hand-crafting things for others. I remember years ago when I would see such things at craft sales and such, I'd wonder why they were more expensive than I thought they would be, cards and such. Now, I know. Not only do supplies cost, but the time, effort and creativity has a "cost" also. And, really, when you look at the current cost of a nice (or even not as nice) card from Hallmark, a nice hand-crafted card doesn't seem so expensive. Neither does the price of a set of stamps that can be used over and over!

Our weekend will fly by, as usual. Tomorrow we are taking the girls, once again, to Penneys to take Fall pictures. We went last Saturday, and got a good picture of Emily, but both girls were mostly uncooperative. Maddie gave us nothing, so we go back tomorrow to try again. Let's hope!! I may have to actually put on make up and wear something matching, have the husband do the same, just in case we have to resort to a family picture holding the girls. Sheesh.

My fledgling stamp club meets tomorrow, too. We sure do have fun, even just the few of us. Hopefully, the encroaching holiday season will inspire our craftiness.

Otherwise, I'm working on some contest entries, items to sell on ebay, and a few other things. Maybe one of the contests will go my way. Ya never know.....

Long Weekend

I love long weekends, when the husband has an extra day off. In this case, the extra day is today, Monday, Columbus day. We've had a busy weekend trying to clean house -- both literally and doing a lot of ebaying of stuff that needs to go. Doing ok on both fronts. I plan on finishing yet another layout this afternoon then starting a lunchbox for ebay. It's my last one, and I want to get it done and see if it'll go.

Picture day on Saturday was, well, a struggle. We took the girls to Penneys, where we have the Portrait Club membership, to get fall portraits done. They had other plans. No interest at all in getting up on the table for the photos. After about 45 minutes, we got a very nice pic of Emily, a cute, but not great pic of Maddie where she had something partially blocking her face, and nothing of them together. We ordered Em's and go back on Saturday to try again with Maddie. "It's just the age," the photographer, who, I think, is new, said and had the patience of a saint.

In the meantime, here's another lo I did this weekend. Happy Columbus Day!

New layout and Potty News

I finished this layout last night. I started it last week, but the vision wouldn't come to me, so I set it aside. Yesterday, I read a sentence by Sarah Ackerman Hale that just gave me the exact notion of what I wanted to do with this layout. Last night, I went downstairs and pretty much put it together in no time. Love the Alphabet Soup -- my first time using it!

Potty news!

I made the headline here pink in honor of my two little pumpkins. They are doing so well with the potty all of a sudden. Emily uses the potty to peepee almost exclusively. If she has on a diaper, she either goes in it or takes it off and uses the potty. She is still not doing no. 2 in the potty though. Maddie has done no. 2 in the baby potty twice now, once yesterday eve and once this morning. Awesome!!! She peepees in it here and there, but until day before yesterday, was just as happy to remove her diaper as her sister does, and then use the floor for peepee. And as late as yesterday morning, she did no. 2 on the floor, too, but told me immediately about the (yeah, I know, get this...) "babies!!" YIPES!! No idea on that one. Still, potty progress has come when I wasn't looking, and that is, indeed, a good thing. I don't want my lil pumpkins to grow up any faster than they have to, but some battles I can do without, ya know?

Circle Journal Hell

I love circle journals. I love the concept, I love the surprise of opening and thumbing through that next one that comes in the mail, I love getting one back complete. What I don't love, however, is circle journals! I do not love that they are rarely sent on time, that I more often than not get packages with two or three cj's in them because the person before me is late or behind on them, that they take a ton of postage, that they seem to take forever to finish.

This past weekend, I was determined to knock out three that I have sitting because they've been here a while. In my defense, I got them all in the same mailing. I'm expecting two more this week, and, yep, you guessed it -- in the same mailing from the same circle. I got two of them done pretty quickly (didn't even stop to think!), and have the third almost done. Look out, Sarah -- they are heading your way by week's end!

I am in one cj group that's pretty darn good -- a big shout out to my friends on the CKU KC circle journal board! I ended up not even going to CKU KC, but these wonderful ladies kept me around anyway, and the cj and our message board has been a blast. We had so much fun with the cj, which is still going, mostly on time, too!, that we're doing a rolodex card swap next. With these ladies, I don't mind at all......

On a separate note, a big shout out to Wendi Speciale, a very kind person and artist. Check out her blog in my links to the left, and definitely check out her stamps!!