There's a strange man in my bedroom...

... and he's making me very happy!

Ok, before y'all panic and think I'm having a mid-life crisis or something, not to worry. The strange man is a friend of my husband's (ok, still sounds weird) and he's building us a 2nd closet. I am going to have the walk-in closet all to myself, and my husband will have a standard sized, two-door closet to himself. He'll move his suits out of the spare room closet, and then I will expand my scrap stuff storage to the entire spare room closet, replace the small desk in the room with a large banquet table, bring up the two Ikea shelf units from the family room to the spare room, redecorate, and ta-da, I will have a much more functional scrap room!

I didn't think to take a "before" picture, but here's a "during" picture ... and eventually I'll post an "after" picture!


My husband thinks I should be excited about this because of the fact that I will have a whole walk-in for my clothes, shoes and purses, but really, for me it's all about the scrapbooking!! Lol.

As a happy by-product, building this 2nd closet also means that we can finally finalize a decision re new flooring on the 2nd floor (we're thinking hardwood in hallway and master bedroom, new carpet in the 3 other bedrooms), get it done, paint the master bedroom (which, I'm ashamed to say, still has the contractor's crappy paint from 18 years ago), and finally DECORATE. The master is the only room in the house that has not been officially decorated. We may even get new furniture. Oh joy!

Blog Catch-Up

Good news! Found my camera cord. Turns out it had dropped behind the computer desk. So, the dog didn't eat it after all, lol.

Now that I have my camera cord again I can share a few pictures with you ... nothing exciting, but still ...

(1) I went to Michaels' to buy this the other day ...

and ended up buying this ... Gotta love it when that happens!

(2) The boy and I went to the last Sens home game on Thursday. A great way to start our long weekend! I bought the tickets at the very last minute, and we ended up sitting as high up as you can sit ... the last row of the upper 300 level, right before the standing room only!!! I was actually dizzy for the first little while. Still had a great view of the game, though. The Sens ended up losing in overtime; a little bit heartbreaking, as they had won the last 9 home games; it would have been great to finish the home season with a win. I am really looking forward to next season ... if I win the lottery between now and then, the boy and I are buying season tickets! ;o)

(3) The boy's hockey team won't be going to the finals this year, they lost their last game 6-1 ... it's been a rough season. However, the season isn't over yet - we have a "fun game" coming up this weekend. God forbid these kids should learn valuable life lessons such as, when you lose a semi-final game your season is over ... I think because of whiny parents who want to be sure they get the same value for their hockey dollar as anyone else, we end up teaching our kids that everyone is equal, everyone always wins, etc. etc. which in truth is just setting them up for disappointment when they grow up. I see it in the workplace all the time ... the new young employees come in expecting to get everything on a silver platter, because they were raised in a society where everyone who runs the race gets a ribbon. (Um, sorry about the rant. This is one of my pet peeves. As a society we've gone too far coddling our kids. If it was up to me, I would have said to the team: Hey, you lost. Good effort, but not good enough. In life there are winners and there are losers. Better luck next year. Let's go to the championship game next weekend and cheer the other teams on ... )

(4) The Easter Bunny came to our house this weekend (even though we celebrate Orthodox Easter, which isn't til next weekend. Long story short: basically, the Easter Bunny remembers me from when I was Catholic so he still comes to our house at "regular" Easter). The contents of the basket have changed over the years ... heck, he doesn't even use a basket anymore, he's opting for the easy paper bag solution these days!





















(5) I have to share this image I came across a while back somewhere on the internet ... I just think it's hilarious ... funny with just a hint of the desperation I'm sure many bloggers have felt at one point or another! I know I have. But I'm often guilty of reading and running on my friends' blogs ... enough time to check in on them all, not enough time to leave messages. So I'm trusting blind faith here, and assuming that y'all are out there reading this!

(6) In this spirit of ying and yang, now that I've found my camera cord, my printer/scanner won't work. I tried to scan my latest layout (which I'm really unhappy with, but hey, at least I got one done) - and nothing. It's pretending it's not related to my computer. Argh.

(7) I did lots of cleaning/purging in my scrap room over the weekend. I have actually got a big green garbage bag full of packaging and other odds and ends that I was saving thinking I would do something crafty with them (like boxes to cover with paper, coffee cans to make cute containers out of, that kind of thing). I also set aside a few things for our upcoming garage sale. I can't wait til I can take over the entire closet and finish the organizing job properly.

(8) On the weight loss front, I am now 23 pounds down ... 6 to go. Feeling pretty good about myself, but almost nothing in my closet fits. It's more fun when things are too big as opposed to too tight, but hey, the end result is the same - I have a hard time figuring out what to wear in the morning! I don't want to buy anything else until I'm done losing. I've bought four pairs of pants since I started losing weight, there's $200-$300 I won't be getting my money's worth out of!

And that sort of catches you up on my life, with a few pictures to go along with the words. Hopefully I'll get the scanner working soon - when I do, I'll come back here to post that *&^%$ layout, which is falling apart as we speak, because nothing sticks to the textured paper I used!!!

Small Burst of Scrapping

Found (or rather, made) some time yesterday and scrapped. Aaaaah ... felt good. Also, kept my hands busy; I've been having a hard time with the diet thing lately, I keep getting the munchies ... scrapping is a great way to stay away from food! More on the diet thing later ... here are the layouts I created:

Twelve


A rare single-page layout. This one really didn't turn out the way I imagined; I think I should have used a variety of font types or sizes. On the plus side, I finished this one very quicky, barely 20 minutes!! Also on the plus side - I managed to scrap the boy's 12th birthday before he turns 13. Lol. Supplies include SEI and Frances Meyer pp, and $ store foam letters.

Merrickville '07


Wonky scan. Layout really looks better in real life. I was in the mood for using up more of the Making Memories Chloe's Closet stuff I bought at Michaels the other day. These pictures seemed to fit the bill. I'm not sure but I think the jean flowers are Making Memories too. The chipboard circle, journaling block and ampersand are Colorbok (bought a baggie of these at Michaels for $1 ... yup, $1!). The E is American Crafts I think, and the T is dollar store. Another fairly simple layout that didn't take too long to put together.

So, more on the diet thing. I'm up to 19 pounds lost now. But, I didn't go to Weight Watchers last week ... I usually go on Tuesday nights, and I was out of town. Too tired to go when I came back on Wednesday. Then Friday night, we had friends over for cocktails and I found myself eating without keeping track of what I was eating exactly ... several cheese puffs, mini spring rolls and bites of the husband's famous smoked salmon later, I even found myself having a cookie with coffee ... and I haven't been tracking for the last 2 days, although I have been careful. Amazing how quickly I go off-track without that weekly weigh-in and meeting to keep me honest. Looking forward to Tuesday, I need to assess the damage and move on. Still have 10 pounds to go and I'm determined not to quit before I get there! I'm just getting really bored with all the "safe" meal options I've been sticking to for the last couple of months, and need to shake it up a bit. Got all excited today because I bought no-sugar-added marmelade (instead of strawberry jam). Pretty sad when marmelade is what gets me excited, huh?

Thank goodness, the next two weeks are 4-day work weeks. The long weekend at Easter is always welcome; and as an added bonus, we don't have any religious/family stuff to do because Greek Orthodox Easter isn't til the weekend after. Hopefully, I'll find more time for another burst of scrapping!

Thanks for stopping by ... have a good week, everyone!

Well, the last 11 days sure flew by ...

My, how time flies. April already. The snow I mentioned in my previous post is all gone, and there are almost no dirty snow bumps left on the ground (and none at all in my yard).

Random info coming your way ...

1. The boy brought an excellent report card home. Nothing lower than a B, and several A's and A+, and lovely comments from his teacher.

2. Sens are now officially out of the playoffs. There are 5 games left to the season, including a couple at home. Wondering about attending one last game ... or waiting until the new season starts.

3. The boy's hockey team is currently in round robin for playoffs ... tied the first game 3-3 (they were losing 3-0 when the boy finally scored after making multiple shots on net, and that changed the momentum of the game). Lost the second game 7-1 (the boy scored his team's only goal). So while the team is kind of doing so-so, I'm really proud of how the boy has been playing - will all his heart into it. Sens could learn from this kid.

4. I was out of town for a couple of days this week on an executive planning retreat. It was the best planning meeting we've ever had (and I've been with that Branch 6 years). We used a facilitator with team building/coaching experience and tht made a huge difference (also, a huge dent in the budget, but worth it).

5. I had the biggest migraine ever yesterday and went to the clinic after work. Turns out I have excess fluid in both ears, and inflammation, but not an infection. Doctor prescribed nose spray and Advil cold & sinus plus. Funny thing is, I don't hav a cold and my allergies really haven't been bugging me. ?? The meds have helped though, the migraine has dulled to a bad headache. Why am I on the computer then? Good question. Should go back to bed seeing as though I decided to stay home sick from work today.

6. I still haven't found the camera cord to hook up the camera to the computer. I keep forgetting to ask the kids about it. Although I did ask the dog.

7. Haven't done much scrapping, but someone is coming by tonight to scope out the work involved in building an extra closet in our bedroom so that I can take over the entire closet in the spare room. We've decided not to include a desk in the closet. Instead, I'm going to make it all scrap storage, and set up a banquet table in the room which I can just take down when we have overnight guests. The desk I have in there right now just doesn't have enough surface room for scrapping comfortably ... my tools end up on my lap, on the floor, etc. It would be just as bad if I tried to have a desk IN the closet.

Here's the last layout I completed ... I've already posted it on the gallery at Scrapbook Centrale, as it was for a challenge (to scrap childhood pics of yourself).


These are pictures of me at 9 years old, on a trip to Florida with my parents. Gotta love the groovy 1970's hotel room!!! I started out using My Mind's Eye patterened paper as my inspiration, and happened to go to Michaels before the layout was completely finished ... ended up buying about $40 worth of Making Memories Chloe's Closet pp and embellies because it was in the same colour palette and so I used a few MM embellies on this LO too.

That's it for now. Just wanted to assure you all that I was still alive. Have a great weekend!