Pieces of Me

You know, even back in the day before kids, I was a pretty low maintenance girl. I didn't go in for monthly for highlights or manicures, I wasn't out shopping every afternoon or sitting sipping lattes while typing notes in class, and I hardly ever wore make-up of any kind and never of the department store variety. So when motherhood came and I fell into the mommy-trap of allowing my kids to take my everything, at first glance, there wasn't much to miss. But damn if I don't hate having to plan my outfits a few days in advance in case I might want to show a bit of leg (shaving takes some preplanning, dontcha know?)

I had a friend a few years back whose New Year's Resolution the year after her first baby was born was to wear a pair of earrings every day. Seems pretty simple, doesn't it? But it got pretty complicated. First she had to find those earrings, then she discovered that she needed a way to keep them visible in her house so that she would remember to put them on, and finally, she had to actually stop for the 30 seconds or so every morning (and again in the evening) to stand in front of a mirror to put them on.

On paper, all of that seems pretty easy, but this mommying thing makes EVERYTHING hard. I can't believe it has taken me 4 years to put that down in writing, but it is incredibly true. Everything is harder just by virtue of you having produced offspring, as if they sucked some important ability to manage out of you as they left your body. But, little by little, I am trying to reclaim that which was taken, and with it, small pieces of myself.

A Few Things, Falling Apart

We watch a lot of How I Met Your Mother around here, and as it turns out, I just finished an episode where Ted has to choose between his life-long dream and his girlfriend. The final line is "Sometimes things have to fall apart to make room for better things."

I'm feeling a bit like things are not exactly sticking together here in my personal world. I just finished reading a book where the heroine's eyes were open to the fact that the life she was leading wasn't making her happy in any way. She was good at her job, but didn't love it. She was content with her boyfriend, but felt no passion for him. And her house was just that, a house, not a home. When she went to a Picasso exhibit, she saw that he primarily painted three models, and my heroine could see how Picasso felt about each model by the way in which he painted her. One woman particularly stood out for her. She could tell that this woman was vibrant, loved life, and went for those things that made her happy and Picasso painted her that way. She then asked herself, "If Picasso painted me, what would he see?"

Lately, I've been wondering if I am happy with my life the way it is, and I believe the answer is in the question. Why would I even ask the question if I was happy? So then I go on to ask myself, what would make me happy? What is it I want for myself in this life? Right now, that one isn't fully answered. Here are a few things I know:

1. I actually enjoy being home with my boys, even though they drive me nuts some days. Sometimes it seems like I blink and they change dramatically, and I can only guess at how much I would miss if I weren't here with them every day. 
2. I need to have more time to just do things for myself, without kids (and even occasionally my husband) around. It's not that I don't enjoy my time with my men, but some times a girl just needs some quiet time, time to relax, to paint her toenails!
3. I want to do some more creative things, and need to find an outlet for them. Right now, I am going a little nuts (in a good way) working on Christmas presents for my family. I know, it's not even November, but once I got this idea into my head, I just have had to run with it. I haven't even completed anything yet, but I have picked out supplies and am looking forward to getting elbows deep in it. But if I didn't have an occasion to give these 'projects' away, they would just be piling up in our house, and I know that is D's worst nightmare!
4. Finally, I know that I need and want to take better care of myself. There are many things that have fallen through the cracks, mostly since having babies. Things like, shaving my legs, waxing eyebrows, exercising, and eating healthfully. I was so anxious to rejoin Weight Watchers when I was pregnant with Baby #2, I went to my first meeting just a few weeks postpartum. But since that time, I've only lost 15 pounds (all within those first few weeks). 

While creating this list has helped crystallize things for me, writing it down also presents problems of their own. Where do I start? How do I start? What do I want most? Is that where I start? Or do I just jump in with both feet and do a little of everything? I don't know, but maybe that's part of the journey? Guess we'll see.

Holy pins Batman!!

Oh Pinterest, how I love and hate you!

A few months back, while cruising my usual crafty blogs, I saw a small button on a few suggesting that I follow them on Pinterest, and I've lost more hours to it than I truly care to admit. What is Pinterest I wondered (and you might be too) so I wandered over to their website. What I found was an internet supernova! If you don't know what Pinterest is, the best way I can describe it is as a digital corkboard. Let's say you're looking around at all your favorite websites and blogs and you find something that really tickles your fancy. Pinterest allows you to 'pin' that really cool thing onto a personal 'board'. When you go back to Pinterest, you can see your pin, and a bajillion of pins others have made. It's been a cornucopia of exciting inspiration for me.

Since I began pinning, I have made a jewelry rack out of old cabinet hardware, a few mini albums for summer vacations, a handful of art journal pages, and have used a bunch of ideas for my sons' birthday parties. It has been so amazing for me. I've found old favorites and some new blogs. And most recently, I've been inspired to start some small sewing projects. Heck, I'm even planning to make some really cool girly lotions and potions for my sisters for Christmas this year (all recipes I've found on Pinterest.) To say that I'm lovin' me some Pinterest right now would be an understatement. Really, I'm addicted to it.

Birthdays

Maybe it has something to do with being one of five kids. Maybe it has something to do with being a Leo and their need to be the center of attention. Maybe I'd just be something of a diva no matter what time of year I was born. Whatever the underlying reason, birthdays are very important to me. I start counting down to my next birthday the day after I celebrate this year's. (No joke.) In the past, I have had some totally over the top parties that took way too much effort and money to plan, but were totally worth it. One year it was a full on fiesta, and the next it was a progressive party starting with renting canoes and ending with bowling and drinks just to follow up a few years later with a full on outdoor movie in my backyard. It took WEEKS to get that yard in shape!

Oh and the presents! I haven't even mentioned how much I love presents!! As a kid, all I dreamed about was a new Barbie, then it was a Debbie Gibson tape followed by something sexy cowboy related (still like those cowboys). But it wasn't until college, when I just asked for money to help pay for all those late night pizzas and beer runs that I realized that it isn't the thing inside the packaging that I really cared about, it was the package itself. I love to receive a wrapped package, to wonder what might be inside it, the feel of the paper under my fingers, the ripping off of the ribbons, slowly opening the box and looking inside to see what someone found that they thought would be just perfect for me.

Sometimes those things inside the box are way off the mark, but even that doesn't matter because there is something inside the box, the giver took the time to find something for me, they didn't just pick up a gift card. Now, gift cards certainly have their place. I love that my mom always wants to go out and pick something out with me. We make a whole day of it. But this year, it just wasn't going to work out for her to come up here or me to drive down there for our day together. Not wanting me to wake up on my birthday morning without something from her, Mom sent me a card with money in it. I love that she just couldn't wait for a time when we could do our usual. (My mom is awesome.)

But in the last few years, my birthdays haven't exactly lived up to the birthdays of yore. It began when my eldest son was born. His birthday is exactly two weeks before mine, and because I love birthdays, I go way overboard for his birthdays too. By the time his birthday comes and goes, I am so exhausted and over birthday parties that there is no way I want to start working right away on another one even if it is for myself. So I ask my husband to do something for it. And birthdays aren't terribly important to him. So not much if anything gets done. And my birthday comes and goes and I get really sad. Not this year! This year promised to be another ehh kind of birthday due to a week long family reunion planned for the week of my birthday. But that hubs of mine, probably because of the Oscar winning performance I put on last year, began the day by hanging hand cut letters from the ceiling of our dining room spelling out "Happy Birthday". Later that night he took me out to my favorite Mexican restaurant (and I pretended I wasn't on Weight Watchers). I think every person I've ever met sent me a birthday greeting either through Facebook, via text, or *gasp* in a telephone call. It was actually overwhelming.

And now tonight, we are having my party. It isn't anything like my past extravaganzas, we actually just took a page out of an antisocial friend's party planning book and invited friends to meet us at a local taphouse for dinner and drinks. But I am just excited to have a  night without kids thanks to the in-laws, the prospect of good food and conversation with loved ones, and maybe a present or two. Now I need to go shopping. This girl needs a new pair of party shoes.

Ahh, Life . . .

It is amazing how quickly life gets away from you. I feel like I've been running for the past two weeks, more figuratively than literally, with nothing to show for it. We had family in town for my oldest's birthday last weekend, and we had a blast with them. But between the party prep and enjoying spending time with little seen loved ones, I was exhausted by Monday, I'd stopped tracking my PointsPlus values, and haven't run since the previous Wednesday. Then my best friend called, asking if she and her darling little boy could come for a visit this weekend (possibly tomorrow even), and there is no way I was going to say no to that!  Putting the phone down, the disaster that my house has become suddenly became VERY visible. It's amazing what you don't see when you don't want to . . .

So this week, I've been trying frantically to tick off all those little things on my to-do list while also finding a way to get myself back into the swing of the Weight Watcher's lifestyle. And truly, what do I have to show for it except a piece of paper with some things crossed off on it? I'd like to say that I've got a super clean home now, but honestly, I live with two mess making machines (also called my kiddos) and two stink makers (the cats). It feels like whatever I do cleaning-wise just gets undone or needs to be redone a few hours, maybe a few days, later. Makes a girl want to throw in the towel, if only it meant that she didn't have to pick it up again later. *sigh*

But at least I have one day of tracking (way over PointsPlus goal today) and I 'thought' about going for a run today (surprise wedding put the kibosh on that). I really want to earn the new jeans hanging in my kitchen by the time the hubbs and I head out on our sans-babies trip in three weeks. These jeans are an incentive gift from great-grandma for losing 20 pounds. Only 5 more to go, and while it might be a stretch to do it in the next 3 weeks, it's my goal. It's easy to think, "Well, I'll get back to tracking and exercising when we get back from our trip," but then those are another 3 weeks down the drain. There will never be a good time to start a diet, and life will always get in the way when you do. So whether I reach my short term goal of 5 pounds in the next three weeks or not, I am starting and working toward it, not letting life continue to dragging me along behind it.

If only I could figure out how to work in a run when I have non-runner guests staying at our house . . .

Week in the Life 2011

Currently, my best friend Joe (also known as my Nikon D5100) is down in the office putting all the lovely photos from the last week safely onto our computer. There are nearly 500 photos on there, but I found an even better source of photos for my Week in the Life project: Noah's camera. After a particularly successful playdate, my 4-year-old came home asking for a camera. Turns out, his buddy had one of those Fisher Price cameras made just for toddlers. With his birthday coming up, we seriously considered buying Noah one of these lovelies, but then we remembered the old digital camera we had hanging out under our bed. So for the past week, as I've been taking photos of everything, so has Noah. He hasn't yet let go of his camera long enough for me to hook it up to the computer, but it is next on the list. I can hardly wait to get my hands on all those photos!

I know that I didn't take as many photos as I did last year, but I think the photos tell a better story. I could have taken pictures of every meal and snack we ate over the 7 days, but instead I tried to really look at what we are doing this year, especially compared to last year. There aren't any diapers hanging on a line in the backyard, mostly because we have stopped cloth diapers after 4 years of poopy washes but also because we don't have a backyard anymore. But there are photos of lunches at McDonald's, a weekly must, and playdates in the park. New this year? Mommy running a 5K! I hadn't planned to have a race fall during a WITL week, but I am so glad that it happened to since running (or more accurately, trotting) has become a big part of my life. 

All in all, I think this project will turn out well, though I know with Noah's birthday party coming up this weekend, I won't have as much time to spend on it as I would like this week. But I can hardly wait to show off what I make.

I STINK!

 Okay, that's I literally stink. I got back from a run not that long ago, and as I realized I had a few things that MUST get done, I sat down and worked on the computer (read: played on the computer) and here I am, smelling my own stench. But it's a good kind of stench since I earned it with my run. I wasn't particularly fast, and I didn't go very far, but I went and that's what really mattered. Sunday I do my second 5K, and I will be ecstatic if I do it in 40 minutes. I'm sure the leader will probably be able to run the 5K almost two whole times in those same 40 minutes, but no more than 4 months ago, doing a 5K would have only been something someone else would have done. And I'm both excited and terrified.

A Week in the Life . . .

Last year I took Ali Edwards challenge and participated in the Week in the Life challenge. I took almost 200 pictures the first day, then struggled to get good ones the rest of the week. I still got a good number of photos and was able to complete an album with a little effort. I'm going to start again this week, and hopefully I'll be able to do a better job than last year. I hope to do more journaling and collect a bunch more ephemera from every day life. Let's see how it goes, shall we?

5K

Next weekend, I am participating in my second ever 5K. I did a test run today, after a week of not running, and I was able to shave 30 seconds off my previous time. Every day, I have to struggle with whether or not I should go out for a run, and frankly, since my last 5K, I haven't been that good at overcoming my own inertia. Bur I paid for the darned thing, so I'm going to do it. Besides, they're promising champagne and chocolate at the end. =-)

Yesterday, I was reading Run Like a Mother, and something in there really struck a chord with me: when I'm out for a run, it's me time. No one is screaming "Ma-ma!", there is no whining (except my own), and I get to feel like I'm completely alone in a way I haven't gotten to since my first baby was born. I mean, seriously, I haven't even gotten to go to the bathroom alone in so long I really have to think about closing the door when I'm at someone else's house, and that's just not right! 

I honestly don't know what the heck I was thinking when I signed on for this whole running thing, but about 20 minutes after I get back from a run, I notice that I feel this crazy calm feeling, something late in the day I am clawing for with both hands. And while I don't yet feel like I can honestly call myself a runner, I look forward to the day when the runs no longer seem like such a monumental task as they do now, and I can truthfully call myself a running mother.

Blog? What blog?

I am trying to decide exactly what I want my blog to be about. Should it be about my family? My craftiness? My running? My random ramblings? I've tried different things in the past. I started this one just to follow my running life (didn't go so well) and then continued it later to document my art journal (didn't work so well either.)

So I'm thinking that what will work best is if I just start writing about my life and everything in it. I did this previously in another blog, one my hubby said I used to get out of doing anything else. So here we go with a new blog style. EEK!!

I Love It! I LOVE It!!

I really need to take a photography class so that the photos I take of my projects come out better. I LOVE this piece, but I don't think this photo really does it justice. I had a picture in my mind when I started working on it, and it came out even better than I pictured. I tried out watercolor crayons, and I couldn't have asked for a better medium. They're easy to handle and blend like pastels, but also make this lovely wash when you add water. The shading they provided on the carrot was unintentional, but it turned out so nice I may just have to try to do it on another project in the future! The only thing I have a bit of a problem with is that my soil line tilts a little downward on the right, but that's okay. I live on a hill so it's just true to life. =-) I am so glad I decided to start this art journaling project! I have made some really nice projects, and given myself a few precious minutes all to myself every day. There is something so satisfying about taking a white piece of paper and making something colorful grow out of it. Thank you Julie for introducing me to art journaling and encouraging so many of us to join you in Art Journaling Every Day.

Spring is here!

Spring in Seattle is truly a sight to behold. Used to grey overcast days, the sun pouring down through crystal clear air is brilliant! Where mud and uck have previously been, buds of spring flowers begin peeking through and I know my beloved lilies will just be a few months away! Man I love my lilies. . . So knowing that spring is finally here and the great outdoors will soon be irresistibly available, I began this art journal page. And I'm loving it. The photo doesn't do it justice though.

Tummy Bubblings . . .

About 10 days ago, I made the decision to send off resumes and cover letters for three part-time jobs, still uncertain that I was ready to go back to work. This past Sunday, one of those resumes bore fruit and I was called for an interview tomorrow morning. The job would be perfect for next year. It is just two mornings a week, just enough time for me to get some time away from home and doing something just for myself, but still allowing me to be with my boys a bunch too. Slowly, the nerves have come on and now I have the curious bubbling in my stomach that always accompanies me having to do something I don't feel 100% sure I am capable of doing.

Even though I believe that I am a highly capable teacher and am generally am able to express myself verbally (often talking too much), when I am on an interview, I get terribly nervous and so tongue-tied I find it very difficult to express myself. But I have been on a number of job interviews for public schools and can fairly easily figure out what kinds of questions they will ask at the interview. But this job is for a cooperative preschool and I haven't a clue what they will be asking me there.

I am trying to just let go of the nervousness and to just relax so I can be myself at the interview, but that is easier said than done. At it's core, a job interview is a situation where you are being compared to a set of parameters that are often undisclosed to you. I don't know a single person who feels comfortable being measured thus, and I certainly fear being found wanting.  So, we shall just see how the interview goes and the following week's storytime interview.

Not Much Art Journaling. . .

But I have been doing some creative stuff, mostly some mini albums inspired by Monika Wright. The first is a mini I made for my hubby for our anniversary.

Okay, our anniversary was back in January, but I had the darnedest time getting some of those photos off my computer. Turns out my uber efficient husband has backed up a bunch of the older photos and removed the actual files from my computer (though the thumbnails are still there) so I had to wait until after giving him the unfinished album to find out how to get to those files.

Then I decided to get to work on a mini the describes the Christmas ornaments we have. We get a new one each year that describes something we've done that year. Above is a star for when Liam was born and a gingerbread house for our new house.

I also started a journal designed to help me recommit to my weight loss goals. I've been a member since 2008, taking a break while I was pregnant with Liam of course. But since Liam's birth, more than a year ago, I've lost a whopping 10 pounds. As it is right now, I was basically just flushing that $40 down the toilet each month, so I decided that if I switched to writing about things I'm thinking and feeling rather than eating, that would help in two ways. 1) It would keep me busy doing something other than eating my feelings, and 2) Maybe if I stop to actually think about those feelings, I can learn to understand what is going inside me.

My final project is Liam's first year album. Just like with Noah's first  year album, I am WAY behind in this (Liam is 16 months now.) So this past weekend I just plowed right through it. Thankfully I had done a really good job of organizing my photos and collecting stuff for the album, and just had to put everything together. I'll post photos when it's all done.

My Favorite AJED Page this week.

Some days are harder than others to feel tender feelings for my family. This week, on a particularly loud day, I was taking a break and browsing the web looking for some art journal inspiration and found just a phrase that triggered something in me. "Love List". I walked into the kitchen, spread some thinned acrylic on a piece of paper, and got to work. First I busted out some of my letter stamps and stamped the word "Love List". Then I pulled out my tiny ones and added the "my" at the beginning. Initially, I was going to just list some things I loved, not really using any photos, but these photos happened to be in my workspace (left over from another project) and they found a home here. Then I filled in the white space with other things I love and more hearts. I don't particularly love the colors I used inside the hearts, but I love how it turned out. I can always change the colors later, right? =-) Best part, even when those beautiful boys are driving me nuts, I still have something to smile about when I look at this.

AJED progress

I began this before the "incident", so it was pretty easy to finish.

 Now, it may look like I haven't made any progress on my Art Journal because I haven't posted anything about it in over a month, but in fact, I have been working in it. The *%$@# finger took FOREVER to heal, and even now, it feels just plain weird when I type or hold a pen/pencil/brush. It feels like there is a ridge of scar tissue right down the center of my fingertip, and that is taking a bit for me to get used to. But despite this "weirdness," I still plugged away. I also fell victim this month to the dreaded Out-of-sight-out-of-mind-itis. We had a few dinner parties, and since I tend to leave my art journal stuff out on the kitchen counter, I had to put everything away. It took me awhile to notice that it wasn't out and I wasn't using it! Anyway, enough excuses. Here are the pages I completed this month:

I did all the painting for this page back in August when Julie hosted the first Art Journal Week. I begged for journaling, and since writing was less painful than drawing, It was a natural options. Besides, something HAD to be created on Valentine's Day. =-)

Another text heavy page because it was easier than anything more "art" intensive. I did enjoy playing around with the watercolors for the background. I would have liked to blend the center in a bit more, but that can be something I do on another page.

This one was inspired by something I saw in the Flickr pool but when I went back to find it later (and give the artist credit), I couldn't find it. I really enjoyed working on this page, more than I really thought I would. And I felt SO much better emotionally after doing this than I had beforehand.

This doodle is begging for something more to be added to it, but I just haven't figured out what yet. I'll figure it out. Eventually.

One day, I was at a coffee shop and really wished I had a travelling kit for my art journaling things. I looked around and couldn't find anything that fit my needs, so I made one. It's basically a fabric envelope that is just big enough for my sketch pad and an elastic band that fits around the pad to hold my pens and water brush. I love it!

AJED Setback

Well goodness. Last week I got a dish washing injury that is keeping me from doing much of what I want in my art journal. I cut, rather deeply, the tip of my right index finger which makes it incredibly difficult, and painful, to wield anything in that hand. As I am rather right-handed, I can't just switch to the other one. Today, I just said enough's enough and thought about what I could do. I ended up pulling out a few pages for in my journal and started slapping some watercolor onto them in preparation for something else later.

I was amazed by how good just that little thing felt. There was something about brushing that color across the page that was calming and exciting at the same time. I'm hoping to heal quickly so that I can get back to the detail work soon.

Art is scary

I'm the kind of person who has to have a personal calendar. I write down everything in my life in there: doctor's appointments, Girls' Night Out, dates with my hubby, playdates, even what I plan for us to have dinner every night. This year, I found a Retro Mama calendar that just spoke to me. On one particularly rough day with the kids, I decided to do a little art therapy and tore out a photo from the calendar. I adhered it in my journal and decided to add the talk bubble. Then I sat and stared at the thing every day for a week as it sat out on my counter.

 

I had no idea what to do with that darn thing, but I hated it. I realized that I should have probably painted the background before adding the picture, but what could I do about it now? Then, I saw an episode of The Joy of Painting (I love that show!) and saw Bob Ross use Contact paper to make a pseudo frame on a painting. He put the paper around the outside edge of his canvas then painted the center of the canvas, occasionally overlapping the Contact paper, and when he took it off, voila! A frame showed up on the painting. So I tried it on my journal page, but sorta in reverse. I put the Contact paper over the elements I didn't want to paint, then went at putting a background on.

 

To be honest, I didn't have much of a plan here, but I thought perhaps blending some colors from top to bottom would look nice. It just didn't turn out the way I'd planned. It was too bright. So I just kept adding things to the page. First some white to tone it down, and when that didn't make it less "pretty", I pulled out the black.

 

It was just about this time that my husband really got nervous. I think he thought I'd lost my marbles or something the way I kept mumbling to myself and making these grunting noises. "I liked it how it was when you started Honey." Problem was, I didn't and I couldn't tell him what it was I was trying to do (he also didn't know about the Contact paper yet.)

 

Right here, this is where my Ah-Ha moment occurred. Those grunts turned into a sigh and I got REALLY excited.  Again, my husband was a little worried about me as I bounced around the kitchen waiting for the paint to dry.

Then I took off the Contact paper and I instantly felt contented. This page suddenly showed exactly how I felt when the kids were doing their thing. Perhaps I'll add some journaling later, but I don't think I really have to. This page perfectly conveys the frustration and the feeling of being overwhelmed that I sometimes feel being a stay-at-home-mom.

My new art journal page

I guess I broke through that fear I was experiencing a few weeks ago because, slowly but surely, I filled that page and I'm so glad I did. I love the end product. What do you think?

 I was so happy with how things were going, this was the point I froze. I think I was afraid of "messing up", that I didn't want to risk putting something new on the page. But after a little internet browsing for inspiration, I started going at it.

 I had originally planned on adding color to the entire page, but after doing just the area around the leaves, I decided I love the contrast between the colors and the black and white zentangle. I still might add a little something in the colored area, but I'm in love with this as it is right now.

We are experiencing technical issues . . .

I was suddenly struck by some kind of creative bug last night and got two new pages started (though not yet completed) and wanted to take a chance to post some pictures here. Unfortunately, I am having one doozie of a problem getting them to move from my camera to my computer then onto the web. Hopefully, I'll be able to do it tomorrow because I am really happy with how they are shaping up, even if I'm in a bit of a fearful moment with them. I'm so happy with them, it is making it hard to continue even though I know they aren't finished. I don't want to risk "messing" them up. It's a feeling I've had before and I know I'll get over it. It will just take a courageous moment, then I'll be able to continue on. But until then, I'll be making a nice backlog of great starts and that's never a bad thing.

Not much to show . . .

I've gotten a chance to take a look at some of my fellow Art Journaling Everyday participants' projects, and I am awed by some of them. I, on the other hand, don't have much to show for what done as far as Art Journaling is concerned. I have done some, honest! LOL. The color blocked page in my previous post? I added some journaling along with a bit of doodling. I discovered that the blocks are actually much too dark for that, but is all a learning process, right? I have also been doing a lot of collecting lately in my free time, mostly of photographs and magazine bits that I plan on using in various projects, so tonight I plan to get into the trenches so to speak after Daddy gets the kids to run up for bed. Which reminds me, shouldn't they be up from nap by now?

Not much to show for my first day of art journaling, but it's a start. I decided not to buy a special art journal for the project. Instead, I collected bits of watercolor paper I have and put them loosely inside an old hard bound sketchbook that I cut the pages out of. I spent much of this afternoon working on getting the office pulled together, and was able to complete 3 scrapbook layouts which is amazing all by itself! I couldn't get a good picture of them to post here. I wonder if all the other bloggers I've seen are scanning their layouts to post on their blogs because I just couldn't get a good shot of one. Oh well, it's a learning process.

Anyway, by the time the kids were climbing into bed, I discovered that I hadn't done anything for my art journal (though I got lots of creative time in earlier today). So what I ended up doing was color blocking a piece of paper in about 10 minutes with the plan of doing some more on it another time. Guess we'll see where it goes from here. =-)