Hop To It Challenge #10

It's Earth Day. In keeping with the whole Green-theme, today's challenge is to create a monochromatic layout, using green. If you need a neutral, go for Kraft. Today's sketch is from Nuts About Sketches a fan-favorite 2-pager.

This along with the other challenges are due Sunday evening to be eligible for the Cookie Jar Treat.

Week in the Life Day #2

I'm taking the pictures, I'm just a bit behind in the whole posting of the pictures - so you're gonna get bombarded here in the next little bit :) This is Tuesday, April 20th.

This, after making lunches, is where I start my day; "presents" from the breakfast club. I guess they at least made it to the sink.

The sound of the vacuum, not the running of it, the rolling of it from the hall closet (shoot sometimes it's just the sound of the closet door opening) and Matthew comes running! He loves the vacuum, and will happily vacuum for several minutes. There are patches of carpeting that I know are much, much cleaner that the rest of the floor.

This is my "sorting space." The before. Before sorting begins, before the month gets crazy, before the next month's orders start arriving and, most importantly, before it moves to my studio/office downstairs. It's only taken almost a year to rearrange things, lots of things and finally making enough progress that it's time to get this stuff moved downstairs.

A boy and his I-love-dogs-(especially this one)-but-not-sure-what-I'd-do-if-it-was-the-real-thing Dog.

The front of the house, with little disks of green showing up on the Aspens, a sprinkle of green in the north-facing frontyard grass (the backyard is fully green) and a couple pops of yellow in the daffodils - FINALLY some COLOR!

The road much traveled - the way to school, the way to practice - lots of practices. I could drive it in my sleep and sometimes I think I do.

Same road, going back towards home, or in this case back out to Long Lake Ranch to pick up boy #1 from practice #1, after dropping off boy #2 at practice #2.

Boy #1 at practice #1.

Boy #1, #2 and #3 are in the car and we are again on the same road, heading, again, back toward home (this time for good) after dropping off girl #1 at practice #3 (she has a carpool return trip.) Four kids. Three practices. Two and half hours of driving.

Week in the Life Day #1 Revisited

Actually, it's just the photos and thoughts from yesterday, Day #1, hence the "revisited." It was fun to capture pieces and parts of the day again - it's what I enjoyed about the 365 Project.

Tom enjoys making breakfast for himself, though he'll share, and the past couple mornings I've come downstairs to the smell of his french toast. Explains where all my eggs are going.

He's usually my oatmeal boy, but thought we'd change things up a bit and go for our first bowl of cold cereal and milk. Well, first of his own, he has no problems sneaking bites from mine. From the looks of it, Cheerios are a hit with milk! Now the big question, will he eat oatmeal again?

I'd like to say it's milk, or water, or at least tea. But no, it's my coffee - fully loaded. He snuck up behind me while I was folding clothes - all his giggling and enjoyment had me turn to see what the fun was all about. COFFEE!

This is our third solar system - the first for Jackson though. He knew what he wanted and spent a week getting it just that way. You'd have to know Jackson to know how "Jackson" this truly is; our Lego Brickmaster.

There are days when homework is on the run. But this isn't bad a book, Dad as a wind break and sorta soft grass. If it weren't for the wind, it would have been a perfect evening.

There are perks to a busy sports season - lots of family time.

Spring in Colorado. Deep blue skies.

5:30 make-game. 7-0 Loss. Or maybe 8-0 - I've blocked it from my mind. And, as for that 2-page layout. . .ah . . . yeah. If that's gonna happen there's gonna need to be some serious editing or thumbnail sized photos.

See ya tomorrow.

Hop to It Challenge #9

REMINDER: Your Hometown Assignment #3: Neighborhood Park is due Wednesday evening. Earth Day is this week and so in honor of that, today's challenge is to go green on your layout. You decided what you'd like to reuse; clothing tags, packaging, buttons from your sewing box, etc. The sketch to go with it is from Page Maps. Hop To It Challenges from this week are due Sunday evening.

So, it was a winning weekend for our family; 11 y.o. won his game 3-0, 13 y.o. won her game taking rally's #2 and #3 and 9 y.o. won his game 3-0! Weather cooperated most of the day so that was a bonus. Sunday was just a nice, as quiet as it gets in this house, day. However, Saturday night it was all about cropping! I finished four pages; two 1-pagers and one 2-pager.

Week in the Life Day #1

Did I mention that Apron Strings is sponsoring two kits to the Week in the Life over at Ali Edwards blog? True. Leave your comments over there for a shot to win, and as they say in math, "show your work" here and you could win something from me, too. :) I'm excited to start and was reading some of her posts about prepping for the week - that ambitious, talented woman is planning four pages per day. FOUR. PER DAY! And I'm just planning two for the WHOLE WEEK. LOL. But you know, that's what's so great about this exercise - you get to choose what works best for you. One page, one layout or one book - your choice. Read up on some of the great ideas she has for this year's version. I've already started taking pictures - a sure fire way I'll outgrow my 2-page layout by the end of the day. I also have no plan. Part of the fun is staying open to however it comes together. I'm also finding it's going to be a great way to play with and practice my photography. Come play along. Check out Ali's blog, then post a couple examples of what you're doing sometime during the week. I

Hometown: Assignment #3

Friday! WooHoo! It was a pretty good day today - the sun was sort of out, the wind was only slightly blowing and the rain has held off. But the best part was while driving to Costco I noticed how there's this tinge of green on the trees, bushes and grass. That great yellow-green that tells you new buds are popping. And if you look a little longer you'll notice little bits of reds and yellows that tell you tulips and daffodils are blooming, too. As thoughts turn to Spring and the chance to get out, or at least open doors and windows to the fresh air, in our house, thoughts of and requests to go to the park become more frequent. We are lucky, our backyard may be postage-stamp big, but we have a park less than a block away. I can see it from my kitchen window. It's a great little neighborhood pocket park. When the land here was a farm, the park space was an orchard, so there are huge apple trees, though they don't seem to be fruit-bearing anymore, a creek and a haunted (or enchanted depending on the season) "forest." Add the playground equipment and a large, open, grassy space and it's better than a backyard.

It was the scene for many neighborhood activities: Egg Hunts, with the bright colored orbs spread out all over the grassy area - hardly hidden, but exciting nonetheless. Pumpkin Patches, with mini pumpkins strewn in the haunted forest, which was decorated with other beasties and treats. 4th of July Picnics, where the 4th of July Bike Parade would end with cool refreshments like Popsicles and lemonade. There were pony rides, balloon artists, puppeteers, fire trucks and even a brass quartet that played Christmas music when Santa came to the park one frozen December afternoon. So much of my kids' holidays were enjoyed there. It's a little sad now, though, with the social committee gone, Matthew won't get those experiences that his siblings enjoyed for several years. He'll just know it as the park with the great haunted forest and a creek for "crawdadding." The sight for buried treasure and ghost hunting. And a good place to go swing. Assignment #3: Photograph your local park. One you go to regularly, be it traditional playground-style or maybe less traditional. Maybe your time, these days, is spent at soccer parks and baseball parks. Whatever type of park you frequent, take a shot of it. Have it linked up by Wednesday evening to be eligible for Treats.

Get Ready for "Week in the Life"

Next week we'll be following along with Ali Edwards' "Week in the Life" (Apron Strings is a sponsor! :D) - in addition to "Hop To It" challenges. I'll keep the challenges light with sketches for those who want to participate in Ali's, too. You can click the image above and go to her blog to read up about it and see last year's, but it sounds really fun and I plan to play. She has great ideas of what to collect or maybe a focus you could take. If you did Project 365, something like it or wanted to do it, this is a really great exercise. She talks about prepping for the week, prep is always a good idea, but she is also doing a mini album; I'm sure it'll be awesome, but for me I'm going more simple, though I DO love a mini album. Shoot, I still have my Project 365 to finish and my December Daily album - so, yeah, my Week in the Life will be a two-page layout. I'm focusing on pictures to capture the week, but will see what else I may be able to collect.

I don't see any first layout links :D, I need to look on my desktop next time I'm down there and see if the photo of my first layout is down there. If so, I'll post it. I AM NOT ASHAMED, LOL.

Okay, that's it for today. I've got a sick little man and while he's sleeping I need to get stuff done. Tomorrow is the next assignment in the Hometown exercise and Saturday will be another challenge.