Goals Completed: Numbers 47,69 and 80

47. Catch up on all non-current photos in scrapbooking. (current is within past month)
69. Clean out my scrapbooking stash. (use it up!)
80. Figure out storage of completed scrapbooks.

I finished a few goals off my 101 Goals in 1001 Days list and figured I better update the tally. I was able to pretty much blast these three out in one fell swoop last month when I decided to empty the craft area and downsize into a closet. I purged all the craft stuff that the kids and I don't use, including a whole bunch of scrapbooking supplies. Why would I get rid of scrapbooking supplies when my goal was to use it up? Basically because I decided I'm done with it. Yes, done. I'm tired of spending hours and hours on one or two pages and of the finished books taking up valuable real estate in my house. Maybe blame it on watching too much "Hoarders" lately, but I was looking at all my completed books and thinking about how my kids are still pretty young and holy moly I'll have a lot of books by the time they are grown and where am I gonna put them and are they even gonna want a million scrapbooks? Combine those thoughts with the fact that I just haven't wanted to actually scrapbook anything lately and it was time to be done. I figure I'll just upload all my photos to Shutterfly and do their digital books every 6 months or so, those are pretty quick and don't take up nearly as much space and the cost for one is way less than all the scrapbook supplies I'd need to do 20 pages. So, I went from a whole huge hutch to just a couple shelves in the guest room/office closet. I sold some of it at the garage sale I joined w/ my friend Yvonne and gave the majority of scrapbook stuff to my mom for her use. I kept just enough to do the girls' school pages each year and maybe a few cards plus to finish scrapping the pictures I'd already ordered. That's 69 completed. Not too long after I got the stuff put away in the closet I sat down and spent an hour or so just quickly scrapping the pictures I'd already printed out, making great use of some photo sleeves. Then I just did a shutterfly book of the rest of 2011's pictures and I was caught up. So number 47 was down. 

As for 80, I have a small shelf in the living room where I can fit about five completed traditional scrapbooks, so I'll trade those out occasionally to change it up,

 and the smaller Shutterfly ones fit on another small shelf I have. I'll probably be able to fit all of those there because I can stack them horizontally. 

I am so glad to be able to cross these ones off the list, as scrapbooking had gotten to where it seemed like such a chore. I actually enjoy doing the Shutterfly albums and can whip them out fairly quickly. It also feels good just to make some major progress on my goals list! When I made those goals I hadn't thought this was how I'd accomplish them (I had such grand hopes for a scrapbook ROOM) but c'est la vie! :)

Self Portrait (reposted)

Kera was taking photos with my cell phone the other day. After she was done, I looked through the pics she'd snapped. This one cracked me up and I had to share it.

Self Portrait

Kera was taking pictures with my phone the other day. This is one of them.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from my family.....

kera appears to be smiling at the ceiling

who is that weirdo behind us?

eyes, people, eyes. keep them open!

our official Christmas card picture

To Yours!

Shutterfly

When I stumbled across an opportunity to blog about Shuttefly and their holiday cards in return for some free cards, I was super excited. I've been using Shutterfly for a wide variety of things for quite a few years now. I love that I can store my photos on their site, it's my photo backup. I also order all my prints from them and have always been pleased with them. I've ordered my Christmas cards from them for the past several years, and have always been very satisfied. I checked out some of their new designs for this year and they look so fun. I can hardly wait to take our family picture so I can order some!

They have a very wide variety of different styles, which makes it hard for me to pick just one. But, I think this one is my favorite:

But by far, my favorite item to order from Shutterfly for the holidays, are their calendars. For the past few years I've ordered them for my folks and Erik's folks as Christmas gifts. They are perfect for the grandparents who love their grand kids. I just put in seasonal pictures from this year for each month for the next year and voila! Great gift ideas for the parents that already have everything. I was beyond thrilled when I found they have a new version of their calendar this year: The desk calendar! Guess what the grandparents are getting this year!

So, if you are needing a gift idea or haven't ordered your Christmas cards yet, scoot on over to Shutterfly and check out their selections. You won't be dissappointed.

Favorites -- My Top 10

The other day I saw this ingenious post on Katie's blog about all her overall top ten favorite things. I love reading those types of lists because sometimes it helps me to figure out a better way to do something or points me in the direction of a product that is a perfect fit for a need I might have. Besides, its always cool to share your favorite things, we all get so excited about things we've found that work or that we love. :-)

So, I thought I'd do something similar, and because my blog is kind of hodge-podge anyways, my list will be too! In no particular order, here are my top ten favorite things right now...

1. Bodybugg  (Sorry for the horrible picture!)

This thing is amazing. I can see how many calories I am actually burning and keep track of what I'm eating. I've only had it since Friday, but I already love it. I think even having it on my arm all the time helps remind me to stay accountable for what I'm eating. I love being able to hook it up and see all the reports about calories, steps and physical activity.

 

2. Our Latte machine

I almost never buy coffee's out anymore. The rare exception is when I meet someone specifically at a coffee place. How can I when what I pay for a latte out is the same I pay for the whole 1/2 gallon of milk to make it myself?! I love making myself a latte in the morning--there is just something yummy about the frothy milk and espresso mixed together. Ahh! We actually put our regular old coffee pot away and now only use our latte machine. And, I confess, if we go on vacation where we drive anywhere, it comes with us!

3. Cooking blogs

No picture here, but are you really surprised? I love browsing wonderful pictures and recipes and descriptions of food that people have prepared and enjoyed. I rarely buy cookbooks anymore as I can find just about any recipe online. I love it!

 

4. MovingComfort Sports Bra

I think I talked about this already, but its seriously the best sports bra I've found so far. Comfy, supportive, cute and chafe-free. Can't get much better than that!

5. The OneYear Chronological Bible

I've read lots of parts of the Bible, but never the whole thing, for some reason I always got stuck in Numbers or Leviticus! But, somehow this one is different. I think being able to read it the stories in the order they actually happened puts it in a totally new perspective. I understand things I never grasped before after seeing them in order. Being the organized planner that I am, I think it also helps to have what I am reading laid out for me each day.

6. My treadmill

I love my treadmill. It allows me to run when its too dark or too cold/icy to run outside. It gives me a place I can do an easy flat (I live in the hills) run when I need to take it easy. It's in the basement so I can use it without waking my family and its in got a tv/dvd combo in the same room so I can watch the news or movies if I'm really bored. It's fairly new to me although I found it used on Craigslist, and I love that it has the ability to incline and a couple programs. It's exactly perfect for me and I also like the fact that we got a steal of a deal on it.

7. Scentsy

Yay for yummy smells in my house. Yay for having them without fire. Yay for the pretty little burning things that look sort of like night lights. Yay for being able to easily change the wax to change the scent. I have a scentsy in my bathroom (pictured) and in my kitchen and they put any of those poop sprays and candles to shame. I can turn them on in the morning (if I'm going to be home most of the day) and just let them go and my kitchen and/or bathroom smells great.

8. Planner

I have no idea why this picture turned itself, but this is my planner, for now. I tend to change them, always in search of the perfect one. I like to be organized and have everything in order, including my schedule. I write down everything, mainly because if I don't write it down, I can pretty much guarantee I will forget. Because I am a stay-at-home mom whose children are in school all day, I have lots of time. And I want to be the best steward of that time that I can be, so I have found that I need to have a plan. I love my planner for this! It also holds key information, so when I find that I need my kiddo's SSN or someone's phone number that isn't in my cell, I just open my planner.

9. My local library

This is a fairly new discovery for me. I mean, I knew it was there, I just hadn't gone through the effort to get down there and sign up for a card. I have no idea why I hadn't done it until now, but I love being able to check out all the books I want to read, take them home, read them (renew if needed) and then return them, with the only cost having been the gas to get there. I stopped keeping all the books I read long ago, and so this is the perfect way to read, at least for me!

10. Picasa

I have been having fun tweaking pictures and making collages using the Picasa program, from Google. I haven't printed any out yet to use in my scrapbooking, but I intend to. I'm still figuring it out, but love it already. The price tag is great, too, its free! :-)

How about you? What are some of your favorite things?

Picasa....testing 1,2,3

I "discovered" Picasa today and all the wondfully fun & creative things you can do with it. Thanks Bonnie for pointing me in the direction of this wonderful tutorial! Now I need to get off the computer and get some things done around here!!

Sitting By the Fire with the Laptop

It's cold outside! Winter has finally arrived here in Western Montana and it had a grand entrance....a little snow and a whole lot of negative digits for lows and barely positive digits for highs. It's probably about time, but the drastic change is a bit of a difficult adjustment. I find myself wanting to drink more coffee than normal and eat lots of the Christmas goodies we have around the house. Our little fireplaces have definitely been earning their keep the past couple of days, too!

I am so excited to be officially done with my shopping and I only have one last thing to wrap, and its a good thing cuz I hate driving in these kind of road conditions and this week is one Christmas program or party after another, so it appears I'd be too busy to shop anyways. Today was Lindsay's Christmas Program, which was good in that the kids did a great job of singing, but disappointing that they put the 1st and 2nd graders all together for it, made for a long program and a crowded gym and crazy traffic. I hope this isn't a trend they continue next year! Tomorrow is Lindsay's actual Christmas program and then Wednesday is a gingerbread house making event with their 7th grade buddies, then Thursday is Kera's Christmas party at school where the kids decorate a birthday cake for Baby Jesus, which I think is really cute. Woof, sorry that sentence was super long. Heh, grammer isn't my strength!

Lindsay got a little digital camera from Erik's parents for Christmas (they opened them early since Grandma & Papa will be in Nevada for Christmas) and she proceeded to immediately fill up the memory on the thing. She's still figuring out that she has to hold it really steady to get a good picture (its not the best picture, but the camera is sturdy enough for a kid, so its all good) so these are kind of blurry, but I thought it was cute to see what she was going around taking pictures of!

Herself in the mirror...

The drain

Her toothbrush
Her feet

Her momma running on the treadmill (we hooked up our old dvd player to the big tv which we moved into the workout area and it saved my life on sunday when i could run my 4 miles inside while watching the first half of a chick flick from netflix. I see this becoming my winter routine til the roads & temps return to safe & reasonable)

Her Papa's head

Her sisters bebo. (If you've ever read Sandra Boynton children's books, you would recognize that from the Belly Button Book. See, its cold wintertime and bebo's should be hiding, but this one wasn't!)

Her new neopet toy bought with the christmas money from grandma & papa.

Black, White & Red

Just for you, Jess! :-)

Black & White

My brother is here visiting from Germany for almost 3 months with his girlfriend and their new lil' baby. One thing my Mom made sure happened while they were here was a HUGE family picture. She wanted all of us in it. The only problem was that the portrait appointment was for a Saturday morning that Erik just happened to be riding his banshee at the Rexburg Sand Dunes. Oh well. I guess its a family picture minus one. Maybe we can photoshop his head in somewhere...
Anyway, I thougth I'd share a few of my favorites with you. All these pictures were taken by Jewel Marie Photography in Missoula. She did an excellent job and her prices are super reasonable. I would highly recommend her and may go back someday with my own lil' family. :-)

All the cousins. I love how she did the blue on the pants.

My siblings and I. Hodd, Me and Rosie.

My siblings, parents and I. Its probably been 15 years since we had a family picture like this.

My kids.

And the WHOLE family (minus one).