Have You "Scene" It

Because if you haven't, hurry up, it'll be gone soon.
That's right, my favorite paper company, Scenic Route, is calling it quits.
My friend Shawna tried to tell me it was coming, but I refused to believe it until I received an email from the company this weekend confirming the rumor.
In commemoration, I hurried to make this layout with some of the old Metropolis line I had laying around.
I lifted it straight off the cover of the October issue of Creating Keepsakes Magazine because I loved the title across the upside down tags.

This company's paper was my "turn to product" when I was scrapbooking.
I'm sad that they're folding, and I'm even more sad that this seems to be the recent pattern in our industry as so many scrapbookers go digital.
I don't want to go digital.
My computer skills are minimal at best and I'm a very tactile person.
I need real paper to help me create.

I guess the job of my favorite paper is open until filled.

Since When Does the Tooth Fairy Take Orders?

Claire lost her first molar a couple of days ago, eating a Bit 'o Honey.
Now that she's aware that the tooth fairy is really Mark and me,
she feels like she can put her order in for what will be left beneath her pillow.
She wrapped her lost tooth carefully in an envelope and wrote on the outside
"Claire's Tooth. (Keep safe 'cause it's my first molar)".
Then she wrote us this note stating specifically what she thought was an appropriate gift for a molar.
Since when did the tooth fairy start taking orders?

Here's Bionicle Boy.
He loves them and he's getting very skilled at building them.
He recently waited 2 weeks for a Bionicle he ordered from Amazon with his birthday money.
Our order qualified for free shipping, so we had to wait extra long.
Horrible, horrible stuff for a seven-year-old.
You should have seen his beaming face when he and Mark finally brought it home from the mailbox. Priceless.

We're expecting Mark's Aunt Nancy from Arizona for a visit tomorrow.
I so enjoy spending time with her. I'm really looking forward to it.
And she's also gluten-free, so bonus.
I'm planning on baking some chocolate chip cookies.

Reading

Looks like I've got myself some readers.
That makes me so incredibly happy.
It's one of my parenting wishes, to have kids who grow up to love reading.
Claire is a very good reader and hates to ever miss reading a book before bed.
Ben is learning to read and I think he's getting a glimpse of the many fabulous places reading can take him.

Here's a couple of passages that struck me in my reading adventures lately.

That's when I came to know that to be left, sent off, abandoned, was not of the moment, but a black ditch to the side of the road of your life, a pothole that went down to China.
The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse by Louise Erdrich

It was as if marriage had been a long, complicated meal, and now there was this lovely dessert.
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

Hope you're finding some time to read something good.

P.S. This is not a normal bedtime scene in our home. Usually someone's eyes are red from crying because they didn't get the sink on the right when they were brushing their teeth and they are professing very loudly how they are never, ever, going to play with the other person again let alone read them a stupid book. You've got to take your pleasures when they come.

Writing

I've been writing about myself all day
I fear I may have nothing left to say
I think I'll go out tomorrow and play.

Working diligently on my class at Big Picture Scrapbooking with Cathy Zielske.
I've completed the journaling through the letter P,
sans the letter I, because it's eluding me right now.
I'm amazed there are people posting completed pages in the gallery already.

The little rhyme above is a tribute to the talented Dr. "Z"uess,
whose books have graced our bookshelves for many years
and who is featured as one of my entries under the letter Z.
I really liked Mike Meyers as The Cat In The Hat.
I'm grasping here people.

Whimsy

My husband is sometimes overcome by whimsy
It's one of the things I love about him.
So he built a gigantic slingshot.
Just because he's always wanted to make a giant slingshot.
It is now the centerpiece of our garden picnic table.
It's actually quite beautiful.
He's using it to shoot apples into the barnyard.

H1N1 has left the building.
It was pretty mild, although Ben did puke 11 times.
He says he's sure he made it into the Guiness Book of World Records.

I am reading Olive Kitteridge for my book club.
I am writing for my class with Cathy Zielske.
I am planning a ton of layouts.
I am savoring the last sweet days of summer.

The First One Bites the Dust

The flu is in da house and its first victim is little Ben, who is running a low-grade fever and puked and puked until 2:00 this morning. Poor kid; he'd sleep for about 15 minutes, then cry and and writhe and whine "Mama" for about 30 minutes, then vomit, and then we'd start all over again. For those of you who don't know, our little community is leading the nation in flu cases, and our infectious disease doctor says this is only the beginning, that we won't even peak until mid-October. Our clinics are no longer seeing patients with flu-like symptoms in an effort to slow transmission.

I don't think we'll be going to the fair this weekend. Any wagers on who's going down next? I hope it's not Mark. I do so love my boys, but sorry, you are the biggest babies when you're sick!

I Think I'm Satisfied

Enough messing around, sometimes you just have to say good enough.

Feeling a lot of love for the blue. I hope there's not someone out there who gets a headache looking at my page though.

Super busy today. Orthodontist, eye doctor (Ben does not need glasses), a stop at the scrapbooking store, grocery shopping, and lunch at McD's all this afternoon. Homework and baths now. We skipped dinner. Seems like just a few days ago we had absolutely nothing to do. Funny how things sneak up on you.

Tomorrow I'm back in Spokane for a routine ultrasound, but there's a solo trip to Target in there for me, so feel no pity. Plus I get to listen to music as loud as I want. And it won't be Wee Sing.

Pardon the Dust

I'm feeling inspired to make some changes to the blog.

Life Is Good

Did I tell you we bought a cuckoo clock while we were in Bavaria, the home of the cuckoo clock industry and Black Forest Cake, which wasn't worth all the hoopla if you ask me?
Each hour a gong rings and a little bird comes out and chirps the time to us.
It is a mechanical clock, handmade by a Black Forest artisan, no batteries required.
Whenever it chimes, we pause to listen and smile.
It's a good memory of Germany.

My first batch of pretty darn good gluten-free pumpkin muffins.
I'm slowly studying a new cookbook on baking this way.
Once I got past the fact that it will never taste like it was baked with wheat,
I gave them an 8.
They were very pretty.

I recently joined the Design Team for Paper Pals, my local scrapbook store.
This is a tiny peek at one of my layouts using the fab new Earth Love Line from Cosmo Cricket.
Go on over and check out our blog here.
I know you'll be inspired.
There are some truly talented gals on this team.

Mark is out working on the pasture fence, pre-functioning for Labor Day.
Earlier this week we had a fishing date in the middle of the day
while our kids were at school.
While we were out on the river, he said
"I'm the luckiest man on earth."
Wow.
It appears that I might be the luckiest woman on earth.

Welcome September

I love turning the page of the calendar to a new month.
September is one of my favorite months;
the weather begins to cool down,
our back-to-school routine is in place,
and it's usually a month during which I begin new things.
Cathy Zielske's class begins this Thursday
and later this month I'll attend the first meeting of my new bookgroup.

Here's that mulit-generational photo I was able to get on Saturday morning.
Grandma Lee is 86, soon to be 87.
Isn't she beautiful?

A recent layout of our cat.
The kids loved to dress her up in doll clothes.
She disappeared while we were in Germany.
This page is a small remembrance of her.

I've been spending a lot of time in my studio:)