Fadedwords

I couldn’t post about these earlier, as they were gifts for people who read the blog.  I made both Jake and my Mom scrapbooks for Christmas.  My Mom’s was a large album full of all the baby pictures I have of me.  She didn’t have these photos, and I wanted to be sure she did.  You can find the pictures of this album here.

For Jake I did an album of his motorcycle trip that he took with his friend Brian in October.  It’s just the photos he took, as Brian hasn’t posted his pictures yet.  :-p (hint hint hint).  I’ll add them as soon as he has posted them.  You can find pictures of what I’ve done here.

They both seemed to really like their albums, which makes the months of work absolutely worth it.  I was most worried about Jake liking his, as a scrapbook isn’t typically something I’d make for a grown man.  *shrug* He said that he liked it a lot though, so that made me happy.

Tonight we are going to my friend Bre’s house for a New Year’s celebration.  It should be pretty laid back and fun.  Happy New Year everyone.

So last night I couldn’t sleep.  I’m not sure why, but at 1:30 I was out of bed and coming out to the living room to get on the computer for a bit.  I started looking at craigslist for some scrapbooking stuff, because Bre was mentioning to me that she had gotten some great deals on things from there.  As I was surfing I saw a headline that said “Cricut and two cartridges for sale.” I glanced at the date and saw it had been posted near the beginning of August.  Even though I was pretty sure it had been sold by now, I emailed the seller.  I went back to bed awhile after that.

This morning I got an email from the seller telling me that it was still available!  I was shocked and immediately emailed back asking when/if I could come by and take a look at it.  She said that this afternoon was fine.  So I took Jake with me… because you never know who the serial killers are until it’s too late.

The seller actually lived in the subdivision that two of my friends from work live in, across the street from one and around the corner from another.   The woman selling the machine was incredibly nice, and not a serial killer.  I asked if I could try the Cricut out and she got me some paper.  It made a good indent on thick cardstock, and I guessed that the blade might need changing.  So I asked if I could try on some thinner paper.  She got me a piece of that and it cut instantly and perfectly.

So today I got a Cricut for a ridiculously good deal.  I paid only $150 for the machine, cutting mat, essential toolkit, and two font cartridges (Jasmine and All Mixed Up).  I haven’t bought one previously because the cheapest I’ve seen the machine is $184 at Wally World.  The cartridges even there are $59.  I got a really, really wonderful deal.

I stopped by Michael’s after we ate lunch and got two new cutting mats and replacement blades.  I think I’m also going to bring it to work with me to see if Bre can help me get it set up properly.  Be prepared for a list of font cartridges that I want to appear on my wishlist!

It’s been a good Saturday.  Tropical Storm Hanna turned out to be pretty uneventful; we had some heavy rain and lots of wind… but overall it was fine.  It was fine enough that I was able to go to WW this morning, despite my fear of the scale.  The fear was unfounded this week, as I lost another 1.2 pounds!!  You can read all about it at ShrinkingMe.  I have .8lbs left to lose before I hit my first 15, so I’m incredibly excited.

The rain was worst at about the time I came home from the meeting, so the ride home was a little stressful.  I made it safely, and had just about sat down when I got a text message from my friend Bre asking if I wanted to come over in the afternoon and scrap.  I said absolutely, and we each began trying to get in touch with our other two friends from school that scrap.  I got Dana on the phone and she said she wanted to come, which was great because we can carpool.  So I ate my lunch, and got all my stuff together to take with me.  I put some photos in to 1-hour photo was Wally World, and by the time Dana got here  I was ready to go.

We took a trip to the store to get photos right after getting to Bre’s, and while we were there we got a couple of other things for scrapping.  Then we went back to the house and got to work.  I finally finiched Merlin’s first year album.  Not bad… only took me two years!  I then did two pages for my girls’ album from our trip to Wrightsville Beach.  I did another 4 or 6 pages for Merlin’s current album as well.  I got *so* much done, and I feel really good about it.  I’d like to take some more time tomorrow to get Merlin’s current book completely caught up, as his 2nd birthday is soon.  I don’t want to be working on this alubm into his 3rd year.

I must say… I absolutely have to get a Cricut.  Bre has one and I was able to use it today.  I love it.  I love it much much more than I had ever guessed I would.  It cuts beautifully.  It makes getting titles on pages much simpler.  I did some beautiful pages today thanks to that.  So I think I’ll be asking for just a Cricut for Christmas, along with cartridges for it.  I want it so bad.

It was a great day.

I think I mentioned that I was going to a crop at my friend Bre’s house on Friday… I always look forward to crops, because I get so much done.  My goal was to get one album fully layed out.  I wasn’t sure what I’d work on until I got there.  I made the decision to work on my Spring Break 2004 trip.  Up until Thursday afternoon all the photos had been in a magnetic album, and I had pulled them all out thinking I would work on it “at some point.”I managed to finish everything but journaling on Friday, which is a huge amount of work to get done.  There are 37 pages that I finished in about 7 and a half hours.

Go take a peek!

Today I have cleaned the kitchen and am almost done with laundry.  I also made chocolate eclair dessert to have after dinner tonight.

Here’s the recipe:

INGREDIENTS

* 2 individual packages graham crackers
* 2 (3 ounce) packages instant vanilla pudding mix
* 3 cups milk
* 1 (8 ounce) container frozen whipped topping, thawed
* 1 (16 ounce) package prepared chocolate frosting
DIRECTIONS

1. Line the bottom of a 9×13-inch pan with graham crackers. In a large bowl, combine pudding mix and milk. Stir well. Stir in whipped topping to pudding mixture. Spread half of mixture over graham cracker layer. Top with another layer of graham crackers and the remaining pudding. Top all with a final layer of graham crackers and frost with chocolate frosting. Refrigerate until serving.

I highly recommend melting the frosting in the microwave for about 30 seconds prior to putting it on top of the last layer of graham crackers.  It makes it much easier to spread.  It’s also nice to leave it in the fridge overnight, as the graham crackers get soft and smooshy.  We’ll see if mine get that way with 6 hours or so of sitting.

Tomorrow is my only day to relax this week.  I have a 3-day workshop I’m going to Tuesday-Thursday on facilitative leadership.  I’m looking forward to it, especially since several good friends from work are also going.  Friday is going to be a very busy day as well.  Tomorrow my goal is to get two more albums scrapped, minus the journaling.  If I can do that, I can bring the albums home and journal while I’m there.  I have probably 20 magnetic albums at home that I want to take the photos out of and get them scrapped over the rest of the summer.  It will be a lot of work, but those photos will be safer in a scrapbook than they are in a magnetic album.  To all you folks who store your photos in a magnetic album… Get your photos out of them!!!  Those albums cause irreparable damage to photos; you’re better off putting the photos in a shoe box.  Or hiring me to scrap them for you!!  My aunt has many many photos of me as a small child that are all in magnet albums.  I’m going to ask her if I can either take the photos and scrap them, or take them and scan them while I’m home so they will be safe on my external hard drive.  It’s more likely for her to let me scan them, but keep your fingers crossed.

Off to fold the laundry and maybe get some scrapping in.

I’ve spent the day getting ready for a crop at Bre’s tomorrow.  I thought I was going to save everything until tomorrow, but when I was organizing I decided I would work on an album that would contain all the photos I have of my mom’s side of the family… at least all of the old photos.  They are photos my Aunt gave me copies of after the death of my grandmother.

I’m really happy with how it turned out, even though it’s not done yet.  Unfortunately I’m not 100% certain who is in some of the photos so I need to get some help from Mom and my Aunt.  I also have a couple more photos that I want to scan and put into the album.

Go take a peek at the layouts here.