i am alive!

Yup it has been forever since I have managed to get to my blog and try to catch up with things. After the Disney trip it was a very quick paced end of the school year crunch time. Last minute field trips and parties and just plain fun enjoying the spring sun (in between all the rain clouds). The end of school was bittersweet for Alex as he was totally smitten with Mrs. Butler this year. But he is very excited to be entering second grade!! We are hoping that seventh grade is much better than sixth grade for Kira. We have started prepping already and have all our supplies and managed to pick up some new clothes as well for her.

Summer vacation is slipping by so quickly. The first three weeks were nice for the kids as they got to spend their time hanging with my parents. Always a great time for them. And for hubby and me. We ate out A LOT! Went shopping at IKEA, slept in and totally enjoyed ourselves. Then the work began. You know you have to put that furniture together from IKEA??! It was lots of fun and I am very pleased with how the playroom now looks with the furniture we picked up last year. I need to snap some pictures and share. We also picked up a new desk for Alex as his was becoming the catch all of his room as well as it was a tad too tiny for him. He loves his new desk. Happy mommy.

I also spent time cleaning my office. Oh man the amount of papers that were in here that did not need to be here and other miscellaneous items. Glad they are gone. I also moved my printer/ scanner so that perhaps I can do a better job with the scanning of school work this year. I was so proud of myself for being all caught up a couple years back. Well, not so much anymore. It is a huge pile which I did manage to organize by year and child. I need a few alone minutes to start the scanning/ sorting/ tossing process. It will happen as I really want that file case off of my floor. I have run into it with my little piggie a few too many times already. :(

Now I am trying to go through all my pictures to figure out what I need to print for my Project Life album. I am ashamed to admit I have not had one single picture printed for 2013! I have taken a ton of pictures, just nothing printed. I haven't even set up the album! Hoping to correct that this week. Cross your fingers!!

Off to work on dinner for the family. They somehow always need to be fed. Not sure what is up with that.

oh yes i did!!

Scrap that is. Get your mind out of the gutter... geez. :)

I have had the photos from the end of December 2008 (yes you read that right 2008!) pulled out from their box for a few months now (read that as about 6-8 months) and have been S L O W L Y working on them. I was going to pack them up and had actually put them back in their box when I stopped, slapped myself around a bit and pulled them back out. 

Let me explain the self beating and why it happened. I first must explain that I have not printed any pictures lately unless they were going into my Project Life album and the reason for that?? I have three photo boxes F U L L of pictures that I need to scrap. The dates on these boxes go from 2002 or 2003 until early 2012. That is a ton of pictures sitting there taunting me into putting them into albums. (this does NOT include the three other photo boxes of Walt Disney World vacation photos) oh the shame.

As I was putting this tiny pile of pictures away I was overcome with a massive amount of guilt. Seriously massive. Probably because I had to take down all three of the photo boxes full of pictures to actually get into the one box where these photos should be placed (chronologically speaking). Another part of it, may have been that for the past couple of nights, the kids have been taking their scrapbooks off the shelves and looking at them. Really looking at them and laughing at what they were like when they were smaller. Alex especially thinks it is funny of the things he used to do. Unfortunately, Alex only has about 5 albums and they are not completely done (enter in the three boxes of photos I have mentioned before) so he is feeling unloved. Major mommy sigh and enormous amount of mommy guilt.

So off the races I went. I am going to scrap. I am going to scrap for me. And not only for me, but for my kids. I am happy they have found enjoyment in what I have been working on for years. I don't want that to end. So here goes... I am scrapping!! These may not be magazine works of art using all the latest and greatest tools, embellishments and paper. But who cares?? As long as the memories are in the albums and not stuck in a box, that is what matters- to me and my kids.

This one is going into Alex's album as I had already done another page to put into Kira's album using other pictures taken the same day. My title is weak but that is what happens when you are using the scraps and are running out of letters. But let's remember- it is headed for an album and not a box. Happy mommy.

This one is so cute. Look at that happy face of childhood. Placing her written letter to Santa into the Santa mailbox at the post office. I can't believe she was so small and adorable. Now she is stunningly beautiful and I have the right to say that since I am her mom! Love my girl. The letter on the bottom of the page is what Santa wrote back to her. Love it!!

I hope to keep working on this pile and the three boxes. That should keep me busy for the next 100 years!!