First Graders Are So Stinkin' Cute

Today I helped out in Ben's classroom for their Halloween party. The teacher let each student take a turn sharing what their costume was and why they chose it. One little girl stood up and said
"I am Robin Hood and I chose this costume because it was the only one for $9.95."
I love the brutal honesty of first-graders!

I'm mere hours away from the Design Team crop at Paper Pals tonight. It's been well over a year since I've scrapbooked with a group and I am giddily anticipating basking in all that creative genius. I'll (hopefully) be finishing my albums from Europe. And me, little thyroid-less, tired girl will be out past midnight. Woot! I hope I don't have to stop for a nap!

Happy Haunting!

It's Still Fall, Right?

It's a balmy 32 degrees and SNOWING on the Palouse this morning. Granted the ground is not frozen so it won't be sticking around, but need I remind Mother Nature that it's not even Halloween yet? I'm feeling a bit apprehensive about this little winter preview; girls without thyroids and cold weather are not the best of friends.

Crazy busy around here. We've had to turn the shop over to the new farmers, so we are in the middle of a forced reorganization that has left no part of our house untouched. And it's parent-teacher conference week, so the kids only attend school in the mornings. Seems like we just get them dropped off and it's time to pick them up again. They are so ready for Halloween; Claire is going to be a pirate and Ben will be a ghoul with a "screamer" mask. We've already made an agreement about Mama's share of the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, which is that if I have to stand out in the cold while they ring doorbells, I get them all.

I get to spend a couple of hours visiting with my friend Jill today, then watch Grey's Anatomy with my friend Laura tonight. And tomorrow night I will be cropping at Paper Pals with the design team. It's been way too long since I got my "scrap" on!

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

My friend Angela features Wordless Wednesday on her blog, and as I go about my Wednesday mornings I find myself wondering what photo she will post for me.
I'm totally stealing it.
Thanks Angela.

A Little Bit of This

From a basket of these

To jars of this

And a pan of this

And then there's this

Have a great weekend!

Art Share

Riding the laufrod full throttle down a steep incline and around a 90 degree corner without a helmet or any other protection. He's a maniac. Please don't turn me in to CPS.

Good friends visiting and laughing together in Olympia last summer.

What are you creating?

Living With Kids

Beside the noise level and the obvious "little people" contraband strewn about the house, I often find other small clues that children live here. I find that these little clues are welcome day-brighteners.

A can of homework pencils become weapons for Ben's robots after he finishes his work. This was a favored activity for a few days last week and I loved stopping to admire his formations on the kitchen table.

A little someone left a cache of chestnuts on a shelf in my office for me. These little piles of "things" that I find around the house are such indicators that Claire has been there. My little squirrel; she's always been a collector of "things".

Here's a sneak peek of this month's layout for Paper Pals Design Team, inspired by my children who love to wear santa hats and pose beneath the Christmas tree each year. If you're a scrapbooker, Anita is all about challenges right now over on the blog.

It's raining and I'm so relieved. It was a long, dry spell and I was starting to get cranky with all the static electricity. Fall is certainly exerting its influence around here: a fire in the wood stove, a bushel of apples waiting to be sauced, a deer in the freezer and steelhead running in the rivers (those last two make for a very happy guy, which makes for a happy me).

The Best Way to Have Horses...

... is to have horses who belong to someone else.

This is Snowball. He and two of his buddies, Royal and Count, are spending some time in our lower pasture, eating down the grass and being cute.

How would you like to be this ten-year-old? She loves these horses. And she's a natural. She helped brush and saddle Royal and was very easy around him.

This one is a little more timid, but also in love. He's trying so hard to take the riding seriously, but he wants to burst out and laugh.

I did get upon the horse and Mark gallantly lead us around the pasture, but I'm definitely the most timid of all. I'm getting used to them, feeding them apples out of my hand and scratching their noses, but I wouldn't call it easy.

You never know what new things you might have to learn in a day.

Feelin' Stronger Everyday

The "yuck" has moved on down the highway and let me just say how sorry I am for the next folks who catch it. It's times like these when I realize just how much Mark and I each do around here; it's so very hard for both of us to be down at the same time.

I did finish up my Big Picture Scrapbooking class with Cathy Zielske (on time) and I am so pleased with the results. It was a lot more work than I expected, but well-worth the effort and now I have this great little piece of me at this time in my life. I don't usually spend the money to take classes, but there was really no other way for me to do this project. I tend to leave projects without a timeline unfinished and I needed the parameters of the class to get it done.
So very glad I took the plunge.

My album, a 3-ring binder courtesy of Target.

My title page. I used patterned paper from the Early Bird line by Cosmo Cricket.

And the guts. All the pages followed this format, so once I completed the journaling it came together really quickly.

Trivia: does anyone know the band whose hit song is today's post title?

Hello October

(cue whining)
On this first day of October, all four of us are sick.
Can't remember the last time we were all sick together.
Mark returned to work today.
He's been sick since Sunday and is missing his deer season.
I spent yesterday sleeping and reading in bed with a headache, chills and coughing.
The kids are both home from school today with sore throats and body aches.
I think I might be able to muster the energy to go to the mailbox.
There are movies from Netflix waiting there.
Looks like we'll be spending the afternoon cuddled up on the couch.