ComiCon...Finally!

I had to wait to get some photos from my wonderful girlfriends, as so many of mine were beyond blurry.

We had a great day, lots of Steampunk, great fun seeing old friends and finally meeting some online friends, and I even got star struck meeting Ed Asner!

 Kristin, David and Jasmine drove out from Texas for the Con. We had a great time playing games and such before, during, and after Con!

 It was really fun getting to see Jim at the UFP panel, and to see that they are STILL using the banner I made all those years ago! Finally getting to Meet Marcy, in person was very cool too!

 So much fun Dr. Who stuff going on, only one 4th Doctor that I saw (had to get a pic with him), a life sized TARDIS, and Romans! :)

 Steampunk, steampunk, and more steampunk! Need I say more?

The big reason I went to Con this year was to go with Alicia and stuff with her and see what she enjoys at cons. She found a couple of different groups of My Little Pony Cosplayers, and get her picture taken with each of them. The TARDIS was a big hit for pictures, and I had to get one of the 6th Doctor. Not many folks would know who he is these days I'm afraid, but he pulled it off very nicely! I took the Minecraft cosplayers pic for Melissa, and the one of the guys at Blind Ferret for Aaryk.

At the end of the day, I got a pic of the four of us in our Steampunk costumes, You can find it down a few entries under "Steampunk Ladies".

Wonderful, exhausting day, and I'm already looking forward to Wild Wild West Con in Tucson next year! A whole Steampunk Convention? Count me in! :)

I've been away for a bit

Oh my, it's been a while again hasn't it?! I have lots of things to post, and I hope to get them up soon. As much as I try to post things chronologically, I fear that I have fallen behind this summer. :(

I still haven't done my pages from the Phoenix ComicCon, and June was a slim month for pics, but I do have some.

We just got back from a wonderful vacation and I've already started working on THOSE pages!

So, I will be posting some things shortly, many of then are up on my FaceBook page if you want to see them there. Be sure to check both the 2012 Scrapbook album and the one just labeled Scrapbook. Anything I post that is not current year photos just go in the general Scrapbook album there. I do try and tag folks (except those who have asked me not to) so that if I scrap a photo of family or friends you should be able to find them.

So, I'll be back with new pages soon, and the July QP from theStudio Progressive Scrap this month!

Angel's Adoption Day

Angel's Adoption Day was June 1. I tired to get some current pics of her, but she's become quite camera shy. I think it's the red light from my flash that makes her turn her head. I'm playing with different ideas of how to get and keep her attention. I did manage to get ONE decent pic of her though!

Father's Day, part the Second

Here's the last two Father's Day pages I made today-

Had a good time with both of them, but I'm most proud of the background on the Two in a Million page. That was fun! :)

Now all I need is a photo of Aaryk in his new Father's Day recliner, and I can get it scrapped too!

Father's Day

I have so many mixed emotions on Father's Day anymore. Daddy Jim being gone now, Dad being so far away, and no grandfather's left. So, I've decided to work on a page for each of the dads in my life. Here's the first couple-

I had to call Mom to get Beth's birthday right, I just love this picture of Dad!

This one was what I used in the Progressive Scrap over at theStudio this month-

Some of my rare memories of Papaw are of him fishing. He took me with him, just once.

I'll be posting more of my Father's Day salutes as the weekend goes on!

Heritage Photos

I took Linda's Help for Heritage Photos class and I love that it's self paced. I was able to pay for it when it was on sale (with a bonus set of videos), and take my time getting to it. I finally looked through some of the videos on damage control and took this photo of Papaw-

and got it to look like this-

so I made a page for it! :)

I've got to find out from Mom if she knows when this was taken, and where. I got several comments on the after picture from Digital Scrapper ladies, and one that I'm going to try to do. I want to see if I can get better clarity on the globe and cabinet in the back right corner.

May has been an odd month for pictures. I've done a number of pages for challenges and things, but I didn't really take any new pics until the middle of the month.

Here's the Ricoh recognition event, this year a gathering of some of the top performers locally were invited to be at the regional recognition event. I was among the invited! :)

It was a great time, I'm just bummed that so many of my pics were blurry. I have a couple of my boss, Kris, that came out okay though!

Then I went to ComiCon with Terri, Alicia, and Kristin (and David and Jasmine!), but again, many of my pics were blurry. I'm waiting to do most of those until after I get copies of pics that the others took too.

But, I do have my cover page for May done-

Steampunk Ladies

Originally it was going to be just Alicia and I going to Phoenix ComiCon, but we ended up with a group meeting to go. Sam, Terri, and Melissa joined us, as did Kristin, David and Jasmine. We had a fabulous time, and even got our Steampunk on a bit!

Here's a page I did of the four of us from the end of the day-

Kit: Scientific Romance by SKrapper Digitals
Font:Viner Hand ITC

More pages to follow, but this one I submitted for the Gals in my Life contest at Digital Scrapper! I'm so glad, and so blessed to have these women in my life!

May Progressive Scrap

Over at theStudio every month we get to do a Progressive Scrap. For seven days we get bits from the monthly Mega kit Collab and directions on how to place the items.

This month was a graduation themed kit, but Min (our wonderful leader) didn't want to box us in to HAVING to use graduation photos. So, for six of the seven days we go pieces that were all neutral grays. One day we got to pick if we wanted Blue, Orange, Yellow, or Red. We each got a flower, paper, and ribbon in our color. We were also allowed to recolor any elements.

So here's what I came up with!

The black and white and blue theme worked well with some of my favorite pics of Brian as a toddler.
If you are interested in the quick page I made from this, you can get it here.

Progressive Scrap week is my favorite week of the month! :)

A Mother's Love

"Get your head out of the clouds", "There are no magic wands", these are things I heard often as a child, and even into my college years. I was a daydreamer, the kid who'd rather read than play on the playground. Nothing wrong with that, unless I'm reading or dreaming when I should be doing something else. Like chores, or homework, or whatever it was that I told Mom I'd have done before she got home.

I'm sure I frustrated her, and I remember being resentful and swearing to myself that I'd NEVER say those words to MY kids! I had forgotten that promise to myself until the first time I caught myself telling Brian to get HIS head out of the clouds!

Funny how moms tend to know what's best for their kids...

Anyway, looking back, I can see the lengths Mom went to to make sure I was well grounded and still able to dream. The time and effort and support that went into nurturing my passions; music, theater, writing, sending me to camp every year to ride horses, and the list goes on.

In my teen aged petulance, I only saw myself be squashed by those words, I didn't realize that if I wanted to really fly I'd need to be able to see where I was going!

So when Digital Scrapper had a challenge titled: Mom Always Said, I knew I had to scrap this:

Thanks Mom, for teaching me to stay grounded and still reach for those stars! I love you!

Stephen & Deborah's Wedding

I wasn't able to be at their wedding last October, but Mom sent me copies of the pictures she took. I finally got them narrowed down to a few pages worth and got them scrapped~

(and now 2011 is officially DONE!)

It's all about the Love

It's Mother's Day, and the readings at Mass today were all about Love. They were some of the same readings we did for Bible study last week.

Remain in My Love, and Love one another. Two commands that are really one and the same. We remain in God's Love WHEN we Love one another.

Love. Not an emotion, Love is a verb. It requires action on our part. Especially to those for whom we don't FEEL Love.

Good things to keep in mind today, and always.

Oh, and Happy Mother's Day to all you wonderful moms in my life!

A DIY Easter!

Easter weekend we began our second DIY project of the year, a new chalkboard at the top of the steps. Aaryk had made one from plywood, but it was too rough to write on well. We decided to paint it right on the wall this time, with some kind of border around it. While at the Lowe's to get the paint, we saw magnetic primer and thought that would be a fun idea, a magnetic chalkboard!

So we began the night before I'm hosting Easter dinner with all the family (including my daughter-in-law's parents from Canada!) by sanding down the wall...leaving a thick coating of paint dust ALL OVER MY HOUSE!!

I finally couldn't take it anymore and went to the store. I was furious and overreacting and just had to get away from the dust. Fortunately, by the time I got back, Aaryk had finished and even cleaned up the living room!

Next up was the primer. Well, with magnetic primer you have to mix and mix and mix until it's an even consistency and that's not easy with all of the metal bits in it. Aaryk had finally given up on doing it by hand and we decided to take it to Lowe's after Church to get it shaken. He taps the lid back on, and then I hear this horrible sound as he trips on the tarp on the stairs and falls down the steps!

He wasn't injured (not much more than his pride anyway), but the primer came had come open in flight. There was primer splattered all over the walls and carpet. We spent the rest of the evening cleaning up the mess! We did learn that auto upholstery cleaner does the best job at getting the stuff out of the carpet, better than pet stain remover or Resolve. It was good stuff!

So, Easter morning we get up, go to the sunrise service at St. Thomas Aquinas (and it was beautiful, if more than a little chilly), and then get the primer shook and back to work. Several coats of primer later we called it a day to let it dry and air out the house before company.

What an adventure! We've since gotten the chalkboard paint on, but no border yet. We're of two minds on whether to paint a border, or trim it out in wood like a real chalkboard. But it is fun to write on now!

Easter dinner was wonderful too, we had a great time and I enjoyed getting to chat with Share's folks!

Sisters in the Spirit

I am so fortunate to have this group of ladies in my life. We're doing a bible study on the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, and it's being an amazing journey!

On Palm Sunday Kristin was in town and so four out of the five of us were actually in the same room for study. Usually, we have one or two that join us remotely (isn't the internet wonderful?!). It was a great day, and here's a pic of the four of us!

Happy Birthday! ;)

It's Stuff to Scraps 3rd birthday, so many of their challenges are birthday themed.
Here's one I did today from a lonnngggg time ago!

My first birthday! I may not remember the day, but I remember that house!