Traffic Ninjas

I’m taking a little hiatus for a couple of days while I’m spending some downtime with my family to celebrate Big Girl’s birthday. While I’m gone, I thought I’d share some old posts with you –

This one is from 2008 – back in the days when I was carpooling and fighting traffic daily.

Today, I was driving to work, chatting away with my carpool buddy (thank God for someone to talk to at 6AM or else I'd be sleep-driving!)

Anyway, we're talking about how to solve all the world's problems and I realize I'm in the wrong lane for the tollbooth.

So, as I'm trying to merge across 5 lanes of traffic (Yes, I was REALLY in the wrong lane) nobody will let me over!

What is up, people? I just need to get over, not cause an accident!

I am amazed at this.

Why is it that people seem to view the stretch of the road they are driving on as THEIRS and are so unwilling to cede any territory? Do they realize that this "territory" is literally disappearing under their tires as they drive? Or that it is being claimed by someone in front of and behind them as well? When did we lose our manners when we drive?

Now, driving is a competitive sport where the one to reach the "finish" wins and everyone else is a loser. And, we all know we don't want to be the loser. So, we race along the highway, fighting for every inch of space and pushing slower drivers out of our way. Driving has become about achieving a goal – getting somewhere as fast as possible.

It makes me want to stop and take a minute to remember by-gone days when families would go for Sunday drives… driving just for the sake of driving. No destination or purpose in mind… I remember many Sundays being spent with my families along back roads and country lanes, gazing out at pastures of cows and fields of cotton and wondering where the next stop would be and what we'd see.

Alas, those days are gone. Now, my kids think Sunday drives are "boring" and want to know if they can take their Game Boys or watch a movie on the DVD in the car. I know that this is partly my fault, because these distractions are a blessing when we're on a long road trip, but I want my girls to learn to appreciate the leisurely Sunday drive as well.

And.. I want to teach my girls about having manners when you drive. I always remind myself that one car length is not going to make a noticeable difference in my commute time; one more person in front of me will not, most likely, make that much difference in when I arrive at the office. I gracefully let people merge, yielding my "territory" and being content to get there when I get there….

….at least that's what I tell myself.

Taking a little break

The kids have a short winter break for the next few days. I am taking the time off of work and have decided to take the time off of blogging, too. I’m going to focus on my family and enjoying the celebration of Big Girl’s 9th birthday and Valentine’s Day.

I’ll be back on Tuesday next week – and have all sorts of updates and pictures for you.

Until then, I hope you have a great day, wonderful weekend, and an awesome Valentine’s day with the ones you love.

Project Life Tuesday (er, Wednesday)

I hope that you enjoyed Kate’s guest post yesterday – and visiting a few new blogs as well! I had great fun hosting Kate and posting on Helen’s blog. We are hoping to do that on a monthly basis, so you’ll be hearing more from those ladies in the future. Let me know what you thought of the swap in the comments. I’d love to hear your impressions!

Here’s my Project Life post – a day late but better late than never:

And the pages are in-progress as well:

I am already working on this week’s pages – I went ahead and printed the pictures I had so far and stuck them in the pages.

You may notice that this week I used a white border on my pictures. I think I like it better than the rounded corners of the week before. I think it sets the pictures off a little.

What do you think?

A Fine Line

Happy Tuesday, everyone!

I mentioned yesterday that we were going to mix things up a bit today. No Project Life Tuesday post (I'll post my pages tomorrow) – instead we have a guest post from my online friend Kate who lives in the UK, is a very talented digital scrapbooker and designer and writes her own blog over at Liberty Cottage.

I’m guest-posting over at Furry Little Monster, so you can pop over there and see my post on Helen’s blog. And Helen is guest-posting at Kate’s blog. We’re just hopping all over the place and hoping you’ll join us on all three blogs today to hear how we think we’re turning into our moms.

So, without any further chit-chat, I bring you Kate!

Hello friends of Lois! My name is Kate and I've popped over to say hi to you today from a VERY cold United Kingdom.

Lois, myself and Helen will be guest posting about once a month on each other's blog and this time I've been lucky enough to hop over the pond to join Lois and you guys!

So we all decided that a common theme would be suitable for the mini blog hop…."How I'm turning into my mother".

Now my Mum and I have a very close relationship, she is my best friend and everyone says we are so alike in lots of ways, looks included.

So why did I find it hard to make this page??

We had about three weeks to think up a page. Everytime I started it just didn't seem right. Then I realised…whilst we're very similar…it's the differences between us that make us individual, and suddenly…my scrappers-block lifted and voila here is the page.

I am one of the Baker's Dozen over at Shimelle.com, so I am on her digital design team. My layouts aren't exclusively digital, but the speed and ease of digital lures me in quite often these days. This is no exception!

Apologies for the blurring of pictures, I don't post pictures of me or my family online..which can make showing scrap pages hard sometimes, so close your eyes and imagine two women in their twenties. The left is my Mum at her 21st birthday. The right is me, aged 24. It isn't the best photo of me, but its the only one I have where I'm not showing my teeth when I smile. Mum never shows her teeth on photos. I picked these photos as I wanted to look at the similarities between us physically.

But then..as the pages says…there is only a fine line between us…but that's what makes it interesting.

The journalling reads across….

We both have big blue eyes…we both love taking care of people
One of us is untidy….one of us is tidy
We both have limited patience…we both stand up for ourselves
One of us is organised…the other tries.
One of us works with our hands…one of us works with our head
We both love food. A lot. …..We both have decent sized teeth (random but true!)
We both love the sunshine…we both put our family first
One of us can work computers…the other makes a feeble attempt.
One is a mother…one is a daughter….
*NOTE BREAK OF THE FINE LINE ON THE PAGE AT THIS POINT!*
We will always be best friends.

I'd just like to say…I purposely mixed up the statements and the photographs to keep the reader guessing. Most of the bad ones are me though. My Mummy is fab!

The kit is from Shabby Princess and was a total freebie. The font is Champagne and Limousine from dafont.com (free) and Ali Edward's writing.

The digital template is from my own range of digital scrapping elements "Liberty Elements" and Lois has agreed that I can giveaway this template to one of her blog readers as I hope to have some exciting things coming up with Liberty Elements in the next couple of months. Just leave me a comment and tell me how you are/are not like your Mum.

[Give-away ends Sunday 5pm GMT. One winner will be posted on Monday morning 9am GMT (or whenever I get out of bed!)

Terms and Conditions: I've just put this in to look professional. They are free templates but we need an element of fun and exclusivity, so winners: Please do not re-distribute these. Please also credit Liberty Elements @ Liberty Cottage (and a link back to here) if you use them on your blog/upload your pages to galleries. All rights reserved. Whatever that means. Winners will be picked by random.org.]

So…thanks for having me here! I hope you have enjoyed this mini blog hop and hope to see you all soon here at Lois's blog and maybe you'll come and say hi at Liberty Cottage one day too! http://libertycottage.blogspot.com

Kate
xox

Keep the fun going! Hop on over to Furry Little Monster for my post!

Not Your Regularly Scheduled Programming

Tomorrow, I will not have a Project Life Tuesday posting. I will probably push it to Wednesday – why, you ask?

Well, I have a special surprise for you!

I am doing a swap of blog posting duties with two other very talented ladies. We have decided we’ll swap blog posts once a month (or thereabouts) and share some ideas and layouts on each other’s blogs.

So, tomorrow’s post will be brought to you courtesy of they very talented Kate at Liberty Cottage. I’ll be posting over on Helen’s blog: Furry Little Monster.

I hope you will take a few moments to check out all three blogs – I think you will like what you find!

Super Bowl Sunday

Today is Super Bowl Sunday here in the US. Thankfully, neither SuperMan nor I care anything about sports, football in particular.

We are, however, getting together with some friends for an afternoon of fun together – so I guess someone will be watching the game. All we usually watch are the commercials!

We are planning a Nacho-themed buffet. Everyone is bringing toppings to go on nachos. Should be an interesting spread.

Super Bowl Sunday

I'm exhausted today – we had a kids-only event yesterday with our church. 750 kids, 350 volunteers packed into a super-sized bowling alley/theme park place. It was loud, noisy, crowded and way fun. However, my over-40 body is not used to that kind of activity and I'm paying the price today. I chuckled at the 20-somethings last night as they moaned about how tired they were. Really? Poor babies! 🙂

Hope to have my groove back tomorrow.

This upcoming week is a big one. My big girl turns 9 on Friday.

Have a great day today!

Valentine’s Day Fun

I was reading Ali Edwards’ blog (I think it was Thursday’s post) and she linked over to a website that had the most awesome graphic.

I loved it. What a cool idea!

I thought that it would make a great Valentine’s gift. But, of course, I wanted to put my own spin on it.

I think I am going to put it in SuperMan’s valentine this year.

What do you think?

Rain, Rain, Go Away

It’s raining again.

It’s raining. Like it has done almost every day (or every other day) for the past two or three weeks. (maybe longer)

IMGP1333 Generally, I don’t mind the rain. Actually, I kinda like it. The pitter patter on the roof is very soothing to me.

It makes me want to take a nap.

Which is part of the problem right now.

It’s the darkest part of the winter. It’s raining. And all I want to do is sleep.

Which is totally not part of my life’s plan right now.

I have this silly thing called work that keeps piling up on me – people want their classes released and their spreadsheets updated. (sigh)

I have this family that wants dinner every single night (can you imagine!) and I have these kids that want attention and love and snuggles.

And all I want to do is sleep. IMGP1341

Thank goodness for vitamins and caffeine.

They’re keeping me going right now. Even though, inside, my body is screaming for sleep.

Maybe I’m part bear? Maybe I am supposed to hibernate in the winter. Yeah, maybe that is it.

I’m not sure.

But, I do know that I’m much perkier on a sunny day. Which we desperately need right now. The small farm close to us has a pond that has tripled in size in the last 24 hours because of this rain.

My puppies are rather smelly right now because of this rain. I love puppy smell, but not wet puppy smell.

Buster doesn’t like the rain, either. I’ve never seen a dog so adverse to getting wet.

And the worst part of that? He gets to sleep all day.

Darn rain.

Thursdays are now Template Thursday!

First of all, let me apologize for the “blog lite” I have had the last few weeks. I have had two rounds of strep run through the house (first the little one, now the big one) two rounds of a cold (first the little one, now the big one, see a pattern here?) as well as a ton of work-related projects going on. Sometimes life gets in the way of blogging. It’s a bummer, but it’s true.

So, now, on to more fun stuff…

I’m going to start working some regular posts into my blog and the first I am adding will be on Thursdays. Template Thursday we’ll call it.

My thought is this. I will either share a template with you (to download) or I will share a template idea I’ve seen somewhere else that inspired me – and I’ll share a layout I’ve created with that template. Hopefully, this will give us all some inspiration and maybe a nudge to get a page or two done each week.

So, here is this week’s template:

It’s got a Valentine’s spin on it, but you could use it for anything. Remember, you can recolor almost everything in SBC+ so, have fun with it.

Here’s a fall themed sample:

That’s the CM Jewel Collection papers.

Oh, and if you use the template and post it online anywhere, I would really appreciate you linking back to my blog and crediting me for the template. I’d also love to see how you use it!

Here’s the link to download the page file.

The fine art of cleaning a room (or not)

Let me start off by saying, I am not much of a housekeeper. Now, this is not to say I don’t like a clean house. I love having a clean house. As a matter of fact, I love it even more when someone else cleans my house for me! However, lately that has not been the situation. Or rather, I have not chosen to spend my disposable income on having my house cleaned. It seems kind of a waste to me – after all, it’s just going to get dirty again, right?

But, that is exactly the logic I have been using for years and it hasn’t really helped me much.

I begin this post in this way so that you will understand that my poor pre-teen daughter comes by her non-cleaning-genes honestly. Very honestly.

So, let’s get to the story, shall we?

Months and months ago (maybe a year, even) I got tired of cleaning my daughter’s room – well, let me rephrase that. I got tired of repeatedly cleaning the disaster my daughter called her bedroom only to have it destroyed in 8.29 seconds after she arrived home from school. I would spend hours (days, months, even!) in there wading through the dirty (or are they clean?) clothes on the floor, piles of notes and post-its tossed around the room, stuffed animals who had been lost under the bed (and were probably scarred for life, it’s scary down there) and tossed into the closet or corner of the room. I would have the room looking as if it was ready for a Martha Stewart magazine layout (well, sort of) and all fresh and clean smelling. Heck, I’d even dust!!

Then, she would come home. And she was happy, thrilled, even, that I had cleaned her room. She would disappear up there for hours on end, only to come down for dinner or a play date. And things were nice. For a while. A day, two, maybe. Then, the chaos would take over again.

Clothes would be everywhere – why put them away if you are just going to wear them again, right?
Bed unmade – again, why bother?

Animals running amok (as most stuffed animals do when no one is looking – how else do they get where they seem to end up?)

Papers, craft projects, science experiments, everything (and I mean everything) scattered everywhere.

Finally, I decided I was done. If she wanted to live that way, that was fine. I wasn’t going to clean it for her anymore. After all, how was she going to learn to appreciate the clean if it was always done for her?

So, I went on strike.

I told her I was not cleaning her room ever again and if she wanted it clean she would have to do it.

So, from that point on, I would walk by the room (cringing) and just “ignore” the mess. I would tiptoe in to drop off clean clothes on her dresser (hoping not to step on anything that would break a toe) and run back out quickly.

Life was good. We worked it out. No fighting about cleaning, no ultimatums. She appreciated that I was treating her like a big kid and letting her do her own thing.

Occasionally, she’d get all crazy and decide to clean a portion of her room. So, one-fourth of her room would look nice and I would praise her (heartily) for the hard work I knew she had put into it, hoping that she would continue.

Alas. She also suffers from the same gnat-sized attention span her mother has. (poor dear) She was off to other more exciting things.

And I was OK with that. Let her sort out what was good for her – and learn what cleanliness meant in the process.

However… (da da da dum)

Her daddy had other ideas.

He hated the mess.

He couldn’t stand it.

And so, I told him, “If it bothers you so much, YOU clean it.” I reminded him that I was on strike and that I would not be cleaning her room.

Poor man.

He cleaned her room.

And I mean CLEANED her room. It was gorgeous. Made my cleaning job look amateurish (which it was, I assure you. He is by far the better cleaner in our marriage)

She was thrilled (of course)

and spent the next 3.25 days in her room.

And guess what?

It was trashed again.

Now, dear reader, what do you think he did?

(yes, you are right)

He cleaned it again.

Sigh.

So much for my lesson in teaching her to clean her room.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: