Delight

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Ahhh a much better day today, We spent a few hours with our cousins over so I could do a photo shoot of 5 week old baby Miles, how nice to have such a tiny little one in the house today. And the older girls took off with my mom to help her pot some plants while Bella was sleeping, meaning I was able to get some work done...... And yes, hear myself think for a bit. Sorry about the slightly negative post for yesterday, it is just that once in awhile the zoo takes over, and I know I'm not the only mom who feels that way. So anyways, I got some things done that I needed to do and got this page posted for the Designer Digitals inspiration gallery showing off a lot of the awesome stuff from Katie's new Botanist Notebook collection. You can view a complete supply list HERE. I just love this photo of Tiara she is so perfectly pleased, and what better of a title than "delight" Speaking of delight , I definitely found it in my favorite snack tonight!!! Okay I have to tell you EXACTLY how to have it, mmmmmmm...LOL! First you need a bowl of reeeally good vanilla ice cream and you gotta stir it up until it's kinda soft ( not runny though), then wash a bunch of fresh blueberries and mix them in, you got to let it sit for a few minutes so that when you take a bite the berries have slightly frozen and they just pop in your mouth!!! Just wonderful I tell you :)

Time to hear

My post for Tuesday this week is a simple one of slight frustration. I love my life and I usually love all of the small voices in my life all of the "mommmm"-ing is a sweet sound to my ears. The sounds of my children in my house tells me I am so very Blessed. I love their giggles, and their songs and their sweet questions for me. And when they disagree with one another I smile at how lucky they are to have siblings...But today I have a very loud screaming preschooler who has forgotten all of her " kind voice" teachings, a tired whiney monkey of a busy toddler and a wonderfully chatty girl, all who I adore. But I feel somewhat as though I live in a noisy zoo, it is as though I cannot even her myself think, my own quiet inner voice is being drowned out by the busyness around me and I wanted so badly to eat my supper alone up in my room but of course did nothing of the sort. I need time to hear my thoughts, my own inner voice, I need peace to hear God.

Finally!!!

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wow it has been a really long time since I have just scrapped for fun, for me, just because!!! What a rush , I love it, feels so good to do. I did this layout of Emilea from last summer. I have been holding on to this photo for awhile to scrap and I just kept thinking "she is such a timeless beauty" when I looked at it. The big floppy hat and those wonderful light blue eyes, and she has this little perfect grin that she makes. So that is how I started put down the photo and the word " timeless" and went from there. To see a complete list of supplies look HERE.

We had a great home day yesterday, chilled out here with my two little ones and we only left to go and pick up Emilea from school. This may sound boring , but let me tell you after a couple of super busy weeks it was well deserved and a needed break. Oh I definitely have to come back on here when I upload the photos from my camera and share a few... Let me just say that when I turned around yesterday there was Kaiella using her own head as a potato head, very funny!!! Oh, and some good news, two of my layouts were picked up by Scrapbook Trends for September! It was cool to get the e-mail just before Krista arrived because the two that were requested are pages I did of them ( our close friends Krista & Braden) they are totally stoked about it, and I have to say it's fun to be able to make our friends feel like stars :)

Bella is sleeping and Tiara is off on a little field trip with my mom. We have now removed all dairy completely ( not even dairy with lactaid pills) but the crazy extreme screaming seems to be back these days, not nearly like before but still extreme enough to be pretty hard on everyone, especially the other girls, they just don't know what to make of it all and it really scares them. And we try and explain but it never seems to make sense to them " her pants were just a little too tight" or " mommy seems to have chosen the wrong shirt for Tia this morning, and didn't give her enough strawberries, everything is okay" meanwhile, this usually sweet and happy girl is having a seriously frightening meltdown. It definitely wears on me some, I really like peace. Now we are not talking super nanny behavior problems situation here. This is stuff going on in her little system, we just need to look further to figure out what is all going on. So if anyone feels up for it, any prayers in this department would be really appreciated.

I'm off to have a little quiet time while the house is quiet and do a little praying of my own :)

My dancer

We have had so much crazy busy wonderful fun these past few days! And in there was Tiara's very first dance recital! It was so sweet! I was worried about how she would do up on that big stage, but she was fantastic, didn't miss a beat, man that girl was born to dance!!! Took a few quick pics of her in costume before she left, and she was showing me all of her moves. I love Tiara at four, the best age so far for her! It feels like she is finding her little self and really settling in to the person that she is, if that can make sense at all for a little four year old. She was showered with flowers from family fans after the performance and I have never seen her so pleased and proud! YaY Tiara!!!

Baby Bella

my sweet baby is getting so big but sometimes she still looks so soft and small, I love this age! One and a half is totally magical, every day new words, funny little tricks and an amazing little personality developing. Kaiella is such a fun and easy little girl she loves to take our keys and go sit and use them as a screw driver to do some "sixing" things, and if she's yelling and we say tell us nicely she stops immediately to say "peeease" whether please was in order or not. She's so polite in fact that if someone bumps into HER she says "wooorry" to them although there was no need to apologize. ahhhhh what a sweetie. That's it, I was just loading the photos off of my little Nikon that i had outside with me the other night and this one felt so soft and sweet.

helooooo!!!

My poor neglected blog readers!!! I have to tell you I am still here, not sick or injured, no horrible family crisis just reeeeaaaally busy!!! I am so sorry for not keeping up to date it seems that by the time I get as much work done as I can it is the wee hours of the morning and I have no blogging left in me, though I do often think of things I'd like to come ramble about or I even take pictures of cool happenings so that I can share them. It will pick up again after this week. A whole bunch of deadlines will be done for me. And life will get back to a more normal pace.

I have to say, the ultimate digi scrapper contest has been lots of fun and I feel that my personal style has once again grown and taken a new leap which I love.

you can view my week 2 layout about how I see myself HERE titled " still growing"

and my week three challenge was to use 3 or more photos with 40% journaling to tell a story

it is HERE called "finding Tiara" Tonight I found out I made it into the top 40!!! wow I'm really honored to be sharing that with some really amazing company, the talent in this contest is just fabulous! Next round they will cut it down to only seven for the finals! And all seven get some fantastic prizes, I'm rooting for so many of my favorite scrappers!

This page I'm sharing today is not anything to do with any of this, just a photo of Emilea and my mom that I really love, and I was never happy with the layout so I sort of fixed it up and the new colors feel more fun, more "them". For a list of supplies clich HERE. Check back soon, I will start up our Monday challenges again and get back to posting more often! I am so excited to be getting ready for my very good friend and her sister to come this week with their babies to stay with us! ( waving hello wildly at Krista!!!) they are coming all the way here ( live in a different province) to have me do photos for them! isn't that totally sweet?! I'm so very very excited. I'm expecting some fun photo shoots, and then just some great fun, and at least a gain of 5 pounds from late night snacking and a possible trip to the candy store lol! oh well we don't see eachother often.

Thanks for being patient with me guys ;)

have a great long weekend to the Canadian folks and happy day to everyone else!

my girls having the sillies outside today! What a bunch!!! just the way I like 'em! crazy goofy and tons of fun! It is neat how Kaiella is just starting to try to play along and really be like her big sisters. This summer promises to be a fun one!

Wow!!!!!!

There is so much I have wanted to show you all and say here and I will be the first one to say that I have been a BAD blogger these days. I just haven't had any extra time at all! It's all good stuff. I am working on an album for my father-in -laws birthday, a digital/traditional mix, I think it will be pretty neat-o and I know it will mean a lot to him. I will definitely share it when I am done. And I have been fitting in some regular scrapping too just nothing I could share here :(. I finished my assignment from scrapbooks ETC. And I loved the way it came out so that is super exciting! And I am participating in the ultimate digi scrapper contest at digiscrappin.biz. It's like a survivor for scrappers where people try to make it to the next round. So I'm not allowed to share that LO anywhere either but if you would like to see it you can go here. The assignment was to use one photo only and show off your best photography. There's no way I could pick my BEST photo so I used one that I really love a lot. Then I am getting ready ( right now actually) to teach a scrapping class to a group of ladies tonight, I love teaching it is so fun to show other people how easy and fun scrapbooking can be!

So that is all of my busyness and some of my reasons for being somewhat absent...Sorry! I just had to blog today though because I have had two really exciting days! Yesterday I was picked to be digi-gal of the day at two peas!!! That was really exciting to see ME! As the choice and all the kind words from the chickees over there. And then today I get this urgent message from Kim on my messenger, hang on, let me quote her "AHHHHHHHCOME BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!This is importantSo sosososososososo importantwhere are you?????Oh for goodness sake if I had your phone number i WOULD CALL YOU!!!!!!!!!!EEEK" ..........Curious what that is all about? You gotta go check it out here and for those who read this after today and it is maybe no longer up there

the BIG news is.........One of my pages was picked page of the day over at Creating Keepsakes!!! A total honor and even more because it is digital! Erin Lincoln says: "I'm a paper scrapper. Have not been tempted to cross the line into digiscrapping. And then I see layouts like this and I want to jump into it feet first. Just flat out beautiful. Congrats to CD for having her layout picked for "Page of the Day" and making me want to ditch all the paper."

whoo hoo! I can't believe it!!! How very cool! So I'm off to get ready for my class but hopefully blogger will be working better for me later and I can come and post some new pics and stuff!
Happy Day Everyone!!!

Oh, how I love this Tiara girl of mine! For awhile people were thinking I had only two girls because Kaiella was not getting her fair share of attention in my work and on here.Now I'm thinking with all the photos of Tiara lately it is starting to look like I only have one girl! Sorry, to my other girls, Tiara has just been such a character these days and so willing to pose for my camera. Look at the joy in her little face! We were outside and she was hopping on the front walk. What a sweet Blessing she is to me, she is really a very caring and fun little girl. I was out tonight having munchies with the ladies on my team from church, so nice to get out for a few hours and just chat. Oh my! the forcast here is calling for snow!!! which is so like the weather here, it's always wierd and a little bonkers around this time of year, you never know if you will need a parka or shorts. Ah well, sure makes life interesting. Good Night all!

A Monday challenge #4 (on Tuesday!)

So first off, I have to apologize for posting our Monday challenge on Tuesday! Yesterday was a busy one, and I was over at the Ultimate Digi scraper chat ( which I will talk about more later) and then Designer Digitals in the evening soooo here I am now! I have finally got the a-ok from CK to share my layouts that I had submitted to Hall of Fame ( they had asked me to hang on to them for awhile) I am amazed when I look through them how very much my style has changed since then! But I will share them anyway because my heart still went into them, even if I would do it differently now.

One of the assignments I chose for my HOF submission was "Trend Watch" the job was; interpreting the trends you see around you in non-scrapbook related areas like home decorating, fashion, or advertising, and turn them into a LO. Mine was pretty crazy, I chose the circle trend. This circle pattern that I love on a scarf of mine ( and a bag and a few of the girls bathing suits!) I made it into a layout showcasing some of the highlights of our 3 week family vacation last summer. The kids love this one, they love remembering all the cool things we did together, and I managed to get 51 photos on here! That is just crazy. So here it is

We had so many great memories I could have done 4 more layouts like this to try and fit them in! to see the photos larger check out my gallery post

and this is the scarf that inspired me

So my challenge for this week is to look around you and find inspiration in a non-scrapbooking trend. Then interpret it in a layout. Be sure to post a photo or scan of what inspired you if you can along with your layout so we can all see how your mind was working! Then e-mail me ( link at the bottom of the blog) with the link to your posted page(s) by Sunday May.7th. Something a little different and fun for this week. I always find that challenging yourself to think differently is a great way to grow!

The Sweet shoppe treat for May is MEEEEE!!!

I'm am so excited to be featured as the Treat of the Month for May at the Sweet Shoppe!!! Their wonderful team has been busy scraplifting Layouts from my gallery and they have got an interview with me up there and 12 of my favorite pages on display! I went there last night not expecting it to be up yet and was shocked to find this very familiar C.D. girl staring back at me...wow! Is that ever a crazy feeling! So you've got to check it out, they had some good hard questions for me ( good questions, but some were hard for me to answer) so it's a fun way to get to know me a bit. And the Sugar babes did a great job making some really cool scraplifts of my pages posted in a special scraplift gallery

I said in my last post that I have bunches of good news and I really do! Getting an honorable Mention in CKs Hall of Fame contest, being chosen to be on two awesome creative teams, and having a few pages published, and now being featured...Well that is, in a super short time, just more than I ever imagined would happen...EVER. So anything more is just such a surprise to me and I just really feel Blessed. I know I say that a lot but it is just really true! I know most of that is not new news So, get this... I have been working on an assignment for scrapbooks etc. AN ASSIGNMENT! Wow, that was a huge surprise to me. So I am scrapping something, just can't show it right now.

I may not get a chance to post the Monday challenge and my normal little babble about my life untill later this evening. I have used up my computer time for this morning and have to carry on with regular life now. So, TaTa for now and check back later. Our inspiration will be found in a totally new way this week, not anything in print! And by the way, Thank-you for letting me celebrate a little :)

Out for publication!!!

It is an exciting day today! I have bunches of good news to tell everyone!!! I just feel so lucky...Well Blessed with my scrapping these days. Such neat developments have been happening for me. This is my first official publication sign! I am just thrilled to need it! For the first time I got a response from regular submitting! Scrapbook trends Magazine has requested three of my layouts for their August publication!!! yipeeee, as you can see I am totally excited! Note: this sign is mostly new stuff by Tia Bennett, the tag and knot are by Katie Pertiet. And the colors make me happy! a yummy combination. It's so fun to have a place to share my news. I'm off to do another post right now, so see ya soon!