And suddenly, the holidays season arrived. Bam!

This last week was a bear for me. For the first time in my teaching career, the trimester ended BEFORE Thanksgiving, so I am feverishly trying to finish my grading. In addition, the family continued our Turkey Day 5K tradition, followed by Thanksgiving with the family, Black Friday at the Mall of America (another tradition), and more grading. I remember Thursday coming home from Thanksgiving at the relatives and my older boy asking me, "When do we put up the Advent calendar?" I was about to chastise him--it's too soon!--when I realized Advent was starting in three days. Holy cow.

Since then, I've come to terms that this was an abbreviated November. I dug out the Advent calendar and am ready to start sprucing up the house, pun intended.

There's a reason my son is excted about the Advent calendar. Here's a page I made about our tradition for December's Write Click Scrapbook gallery:

I used  Fancy Pants Designs Merry Little Christmas for this page. I like the mix of traditional and new colors, and the playful Santas got me at ho ho ho. I also added some corrugated paper for some texture, plus the diamonds and pearls for some holiday bling. All of this, of course, was designed to distract from the absolutely terrible pictures I took.

This, of course, is my lot in life. Living in Minnesota, where the sun rises around 8 A.M. and sets around 4 P.M. in the winter, I cannot take a lovely casual shot indoors. I leave for work at 6:30 in the morning and usually return sometime between 3 and 4. Good indoor photos are a rarity in the winter. I tried using PSE to adjust the color especially, but it just wasn't happening, so I used my tried and true method: I printed Small. And hoped that the dancing Santas would distract.

Thank you for checking out my page! Please go to Write Click Scrapbook to check out the full gallery for a month-load of inspiration.

Recording the busy times of our lives

I am in a very busy time right now. My school term ends this Wednesday, so I am working like a maniac to finish grading and get ready for Thanksgiving and prepare for Black Friday (my family always goes to the Mall of America) and the new trimester...

These times I tend to put scrapbooking on the backburner, but I'm not sure I should. After all, busy times are a part of my life too.  A month ago I decided to photograph and record a busy time in my life. Here's what I did:

The end of October was particularly busy for me. I knew it was going to be, so I took many pictures, mostly on my phone. Since I took them on my phone, I printed them small to mask the grain. I used Fancy Pants Designs' Collecting Moments for the page, a collection I've been in love with recently. The ephemera pack in particular captured me, mostly because of the numbers. I used them to label some photos and match them to the journaling. Here's some details:

Thank you for checking out my page! I hope to encourage you to scrap the busy moments in your life. Those deserve the same attention and memory that the slower moments do!

First weeks of school

 I've just finished my second week of school, as have my boys. Busy, busy busy!

1. Labor Day weekend we traveled to Two Harbors to wish my grandmother a happy 94th birthday. She looked gorgeous!
2. We've started taekwondo every evening for the boys. I have to pick them up from school, then drive them immediately there (so far, the boys have done their homework in the car). Rowan's TKD is two nights a week, Dominic's the other two. Me? I will use that time to grade.
3. This past weekend we took the boys to the Lions Parade in Osseo, where they marched with TKD. Gorgeous weather, though we did not get much candy for them. The floats don't really hand it out to grown ups. 
4. Sunday we went to the Renaissance Festival, where we had an awesome but dusty time (I'm ready for a week of rain). I splurged on earrings, the boys got swords, and Derick got a new wallet. 
5. I have really enjoyed teaching my students. I always teach the best in school.

This weekend we're looking at attending Dominic's violin recital--he's playing Bach's Minuet 1, and since he's getting his hair cut before that, he should have a nice spiky 'do for it. And the boys will help do some yard work to earn Lego money.

Now I'm just tired. I have worked on little bits of creative stuff here and there, but not finished anything. Right now, though, I'm inspired to do something I got ideas on from Pinterest and another page pairing an old and new photo, which I thought of while listening to the Paperclipping Roundtable while I was mowing the lawn last weekend.

How have your first few weeks of September gone?

Random May bits

I have been a pathetic blogger this week, undermined by business: end of the school year, projects for Ella and GCD Studios, and a busy as you-know-what week that will doubtless show up in a page about me soon.

But count my blessings, at least this didn't happen in Maple Grove yesterday. My prayers are going out to everyone affected.

We went to a wonderful wedding this weekend at the arboretum. The readings were terrific, including Oh, The Places You'll Go!, and my son was the first to recognize the recessional as a song from Kung Fu Panda (Oogway's Ascent):


(Note: same clothes as Easter. I don't do dresses.)

Here's the wedding card I made using GCD Studios Simply Surrender:


I liked layering all the different papers (that's me), but this time I also trimmed the die cut paper to layer too. I haven't done that before, so it was nice to see other ways of using die cut papers aside from the whole sheet.

Back later this week once my head comes up for air!

Back and busy

I guess I'm a B student right now--busy busy busy! It's the last two weeks of the trimester for my students, so I'm up to my ears in grading. Since it's about 2/3 through the year, I get the pleasure of seeing their improvements catching hold. Yay them!

I'm done with LOAD--lots of fun and I met my goal of finishing my vacation album up through the pictures I have printed. Now I can get back on the wagon and do some stuff I've been putting off:

• Working out. I DEFINITELY put that on the back burner last month, so I need to step it up (no pun intended) if I want to be ready for shorts in the summer.
• Editing photos. I have to finish vacation, finish November, and select photos to put in Rowan's School of Life album that I fully intend to start by next weekend.
• More grading. By this weekend, I want to have finished 40 arguments, 20 persuasive letters, 20 binders, and two quizzes. Then I'll be about 1/3 done, but I'll have made a substantial dent.
• Choir rehearsal. Our church is putting on Jesus Christ Superstar for Palm Sunday, so we have rehearsals twice a week. True confession: I grade papers while the soloists are singing during rehearsals, but a teacher's gotta do what a teacher's gotta do.
• My hybrid class. I'm taking a class at Big Picture Scrapbooking by May Flaum, and though I am not going fully to the dark side, I'm happy to learn more digi techniques to incorporate into my pages.
  

I have to admit, it's easier to go at this list with energy since spring is on the way. The snow is still deep, but I can tell it's receding. And more importantly for optimism, the sun is coming up and clearly visible when I get to work in the morning (I start at 7:10). Joy!

Here's a peek at my last LOAD layout. It used a sketch from Sketchy Thursdays, and I added a digi tag from the hybrid class to it. Happy spring!

In the Middle

I have one week left in the trimester after Thanksgiving. I also have about 60 memoirs, 60 portfolios, 70 comparison papers, and 70 final tests to grade. All by December 10.

(Deep breath)

So you can understand why I eke in iotas of scrap time, and how much that drives me nuts. I look at partially finished pages, dreaming of how I will finish them. Here's what's on my scrap space:

1. The page about my friend and our trip to the sculpture garden. Almost done. I may finish it tonight.
2. A page about my son and his violin. I leaned on the top and squished it (@!#$%), so I need to fix it and add journaling.
   
3. A page about my husband and me. I love that one. I may submit it for publication.
4. A huge photo I want to turn into a full page layout--12x12 photo. This may take time.
5. A layout from last Christmas of me putting together the boys' toys. I'm stuck on that one. I like the start but am not sure how to finish it.
6. A page about my mother-in-law and her immense talent in photography. She studied with Ansel Adams. No lie. I'm doing some elaborate stitching with it, but my goal is to finish this weekend.
7. Two goofy pages--one of my husband winning "The Toilet Bowl" last year in his fantasy football league, and another of my older boy pretending to be an alien.

This list is a good example of how I scrap--I have many projects going, and I work on them a little at a time until they are done. Sometimes I have to abandon a project--dissatisfied with it, but I can do no more. When I'm stuck, though, I tend to do what I typically do on a page, which satisfies me. Done is done. And so I'm happy.