The writer speaks of the common occurences in the life of anyone who scrapbooks regularly and finds that she (or he) has spent more on scrapbooking tools than on food for the family. There are musings about a hobby that creates a mess wherever you work at it, and as long as there are unscrapped photographs anywhere in the house, it never ends. And there are always new and wonderful products coming out that one HAS to have!
I was raised in South Florida back in the years when it was a peaceful and wonderfully safe place to live. We lived a mile from the beach and could ride our bikes over the intercoastal bridge right to the best beach around. All my years of growing up I was a competitive swimmer and belonged to AAU. I granduated from Florida State University with a BS degree in nursing. I am recently retired but I'm thinking of going back to work to support my hobbies.
My husband left this morning for his annual pheasant hunt in South Dakota, so I have the whole week to myself to watch all my programs on TV (and it won't be football!!) and do all the crafting I want. Of course, I'm still making and selling my Rainbow Loom bracelets on Etsy. Here's the most recent one I made using the fishtail pattern and adding a moustache charm in the middle of it:
I can do this while I'm watching TV at night, and still carry on a conversation, if needed. They're fun. Don't forget to visit my Etsy store "Findingtherainbow" to see all the bracelets I've made.
Actually, tomorrow morning I have to drive 1/2 way to Nashville to pick up our oldest grandson, who is flying out to South Dakota to meet up with his Papaw for his first pheasant hunting experience. I know he's probably nervous, because this is a first for him, but he's 15 now, and it's sort of a rite of passage, I guess. The weather here is really starting to feel like Fall, so we're getting ready to hunker down for the winter and get ready for the Holidays. What do you all have planned for the Holiday season? We are having our oldest daughter and her family come up from Florida, and my brother and sister are due to arrive this week-end. It'll be a fun time-getting to see everyone. Take care for now, and stay safe.
Here I am back in Tennessee again, with my grandson in tow. I brought Cade back home with me for a week, just until his parents come up. Unfortunately the weather has been absolutely awful!! Rain, rain, and more rain. It's hard to keep an 8 year old busy in a home with no toys! He does like to do crafts, and we've done some of that kind of thing, but what he really likes is to ride around on the big farm machinery with his Papaw. His one big thing today was that they had to go bury a farmer's calf that had died. I know it sounds gory, but Cade found it fascinating.
While I was in Florida, I got to go out to eat lunch with my brother, Jim, and my sister, Jan (who had been up here in Tennessee for the past three months). We had a wonderful time, and here's a picture:
We took our daughter and our grandson to the airport at 4:15 P.M. this afternoon. So silence reigns in our home, except for the TV, but it's kind of sad. We enjoyed the busy-ness of having our grandchildren around and doing things with them. Yesterday, for our last Hurrah, we went to Dollywood - having forgotten it was Good Friday - and all kids were out of school. The place was packed, and it was cold and raining by noon. Not a good day to go to Dollywood! Poor Cade and Laura stood 1 1/2 hours in each line just to ride on two rides. My sister, Janet, and I went to the inside shows for the most part and managed to stay pretty dry. Here are some pictures Janet took of Cade riding the kid-sized 4-wheeler:
I have completed all my shopping, and most of my wrapping (at least the hard stuff), so I am ready for Christmas. The last mini-album I made turned out gorgeous, and I got them both mailed off to the recipients. Our oldest grandson is here this week "helping" us to get ready to go to his family's house for Christmas. He had some presents that he still needed to buy and wrap - including one for a girlfriend, who's name he will not disclose to his mother, and it's driving her crazy! She's smothering him with questions, so I think that's one reason he wanted to come over this week. Now he can text his little girlfriend all he wants. He bought her one of those goofy knit hats that teenagers are wearing now - the ones that look like animals and such. I guess it's "the thing" right now. Anyway, he was quite proud of it. I do believe it was much easier being a teenager when I was a kid. So much social pressure goes on these days. I'm dying to start my instructional videos on the mini's, but it's going to wait until after Christmas. In the meantime, pick up a pack of either black or kraft 12" x 12" cardstock and a 6" x 6" pack of pretty patterned paper (or you can use 12" x 12" coordinating patterned paper cut in quarters, if you prefer. That's what I used. Valentines would be a good theme to use - or Easter. We'll get started right after Christmas with the first video.
I made it back from Florida, and I'm ready to finish some projects that I had to leave incomplete before I left. I brought one of my 6 year old grandsons back with me, so I'm sure he's going to be my major project for a while. My husband stayed home and "kept house" while I was gone, and the only thing good I can say about it was that he kept most of my tomato plants alive. I cannot say the same for the house. There was the usual footprint trail from the kitchen to the TV room and then to the bedroom with crumbs scattered along the way. It looked like Hansel and Gretel had been there! I'm still getting my act together here, but I did finish an "America the Beautiful" mini album in Florida, and I'll make a video of that this week-end. Hi to all.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Yesterday my DH took Eli, our 5 year old grandson down to the woodshop and helped him build a birdhouse. Eli did a really good job and stuck right to the task. When he got home, he was so proud of it, and I told him that he could paint it today, as I had a whole stash of acrylic paints that had been going to waste before I cleaned them out of my scrapbooking room. So, naturally, the first thing he said when we had breakfast this morning was "Now can I paint my birdhouse"? It wasn't long before I had rigged him a painting smock out of an old T shirt of mine clipped in the back with a clothespin, lined the dining room table with newspapers, and got out our painting supplies. As you can see, he was still sort of in the Christmas spirit, because it looks like a Christmas birdhouse. He has a great attention span for these kinds of things, so he stuck right with the painting, but I kept loosing him to Sponge Bob Square Pants while we were waiting for each side to dry. It must have been a Sponge Bob marathon day on Nickelodeon or something, because it played on and on Our project turned out surprisingly well because the paint was so thick that it didn't splash, except for the red. It was kind of thin, so we had to do 2 coats of it on top of the white gesso. It took practically all afternoon, and we were both over it by then. All we have left to paint is the perch in front of the hole, and he wants to paint that brown. Then we're going to decorate it with vinyl decals or something. Tomorrow I shall post the final pictures.
