- worked at Reminisce - dinner at Atlas - mom visited from Des Moines and was extremely helpful in packing lots and lots of boxes for us. - scrapbooked with the new Reminisce paper lines "Happy Easter" and "Green Day" for the upcoming CHA trade show. - scrapbooked layouts for my Lullaby class on Thursday. - went with Wendy to see Rachael Davis & Shout Sister Shout at CSPS, which was such a great show. - Prepped kits for my class on Thursday. - visited the grocery store, drycleaner, gas station, and art supply store. - not to mention five full days of teaching all the little artists.
Phew. That makes me feel a little better about spending this evening being a complete couch potato.
Had some time to make a couple decos for swaps last night. One is a map theme (duh) but I bound it with embroidery floss and glass beads. Simple, but pretty, I think. The other is just an old book page and embroidery floss. It felt good to do some "makin" although I still have lots on my to-do list!Lovin' this website tonight.
I was very happy to find out that "scrapbooking celebrity" Cathy Zielske was blogging again. I just love her writing style and take on things. Her voice really comes through in her writing. And this post really moved me. It is all about not taking the important people in your life for granted, and taking advantage of the moments before they are gone. What a coincidence that I just had this exact conversation with a mom of a student at school yesterday. I was telling her about my trip to visit Kristi in Colorado before they left for Australia and she told me a story about how she will always regret not making time to go visit an old friend who had cancer before she died. The saddest part was that this mom had finally scheduled a trip to go visit her friend and the friend died just a few days before she arrived. Not that I'll never see Kristi again, but it is just all about seizing the moment and keeping ahold of those connections. I am not so good at this - especially with friends. Bill and I are much more homebodies than social creatures, so we're more likely to stay in on any given night than call up a friend and go hang out. But that means that I've lost track of what is really happening in so many friends' lives. I think that making connections with the people I love needs to be another new year's resolution for 2007. Also, I just have to add that the great quote Kathy mentions in the blog post was framed hanging in Kristi and Josh's home. Weird.
So, mom and Bethany are here from Des Moines helping us pack and generally hanging out. We have already filled so many boxes and not really made a dent. Ack. At least it feels like we are making some progress by filling up boxes. I took them (and my MIL) to go see the house yesterday. It was so great to get inside it again and see it without the owners' furniture all around. Although it made me realize we SO don't have enough furniture to fill it. Well, that will come in time. Last night I made cream of potato soup for dinner - I'm on the road to actually preparing meals on a regular basis. Yeah, me!
Hope you are are all starting off the 2007 joyfully! I rang in the new year on a plane from Denver to Minneapolis, due to a weather delay. Other than that, it was a wonderful trip to visit my college roommate, Kristi and her husband in Colorado. The two of them are moving to Australia in about a week, so it may be the last time I see them for quite awhile. Even though they were busy packing and preparing for the trip, they still made a great effort to show me a good time. We went to the Denver Art museum, which recently opened a new wing. Great stuff. Also a visit to the Celestial Seasonings factory where I learned lots about the tea business, and got to visit the "mint room" - quite an intense experience! We saw the Blossoms of Light display at the Denver Botanical gardens and also did our fair share of hanging out, shopping, and drinking wine. More pics are in my Denver set.I'm not too big on new year's resolutions, as I've never been very successful with sticking with one, but this year I do have 3 goals that I think are both reasonable and important for me to achieve:* Exercise at least 4 days per week (no excuse to avoid this one, now that we have our own elliptical machine and I'll be attending yoga once per week)* Make dinner at least 3 nights per week (that may sound like so few, but since Bill works late 2 nights per week and we eat out every Friday, it will still be a stretch)* Finish the wedding scrapbook before our second anniversary!This promises to be an especially busy month - we have found the house that we've been looking for and we'll be moving at the beginning of February. So exciting - and lots of packing and purging excess stuff ahead. Also, I'm having my first student teacher starting on January 16th. Not to mention the regular school workload and preparing for and teaching a class at Reminisce. All good things - looking forward to all the changes and new opportunities!
Just a few pics from some Monday night arting. I wanted to get these swap obligations taken care of before it was time for the move to get in full swing. The scan above is a map deco page for a deco RR over at Destiny Art Decos. 
These atcs are for a swap at the Embellished Circus. I was a little stumped about the theme "silhouettes" even though i love the look of them - until I thought of cutting out shapes from photos I had taken. These photos were taken at the Vigeland Sculpture park in Oslo, Norway while I was studying abroad there. 
Another busy weekend - my lullaby class Thursday night was small but delightful. Everyone was excited about the projects, plus they were quick, so I finished early! Friday night was our monthly teacher crafting night and I got 6 scrapbooking pages done with pictures from my trip to Denver in December. Bill and I took a trip over to Des Moines to pick out some much needed couches for the new house. We're very excited about the selections - they arrive at the new house on the 13th. Hopefully we'll be settled by then.
