Genevieve's Blog

January Weeks 1 & 2 :: 365 Layouts

2009-01-28T16:08:26-05:00

Here are my first few 365 Layouts. Week 1 is just a partial, because I didn’t start 365 until half way through that week. I used Weeds & Wildflowers’ Life 365 Set for these.

Crazy Weeks Cost Two Photos

2009-01-26T18:13:32-05:00

Well, last week was a pretty crazy work week, and I ended up forgetting to get my camera out yesterday and Thursday, but I’m not beating myself up for it. I knew I’d end up missing some days. Ultimately, Project 365 is serving the purpose I hoped it would; it’s making me notice every-day-moments that are worth cherishing, and it’s making me use my camera! Last weekend (before the crazy week started), I even managed to scrap a couple 365 pages! I love getting an entire weeks’ worth of photos down on two 12"x 12” pages. It makes me feel so accomplished! I still have one page to finish up from last week, but I will share it here when it’s done. Until then, here are my photos from last week. 01.17.09 This is us hanging out with friends from church. I’m so glad I’m not the only one whose husband is really silly. 01.18.09 Mia and her friend Ashlee. 01.19.09 It snowed all day, so I took Mia outside to play in it. She had a blast just running around the yard as it snowed. 01.20.09 Another cold, frosty morning. 01.21.09 Mia playing with the little toy she got from the dentist after having her teeth cleaned. 01.23.09 My sister’s friends got her a birthday cake and celebrated with her (two days early). 01.21.09 Mia’s new thing is trying to grab my camera while I’m trying to take a picture. It drives me nuts and she knows it! I also wanted to say thank you to everyone who’s commented on my 365 photos and left links to their own. I totally love looking at other peoples’ 365 photos, and I’m even thinking of starting a section on my Links page devoted to Project 365 blogs, just so I can remember them all!

Just the Photos, Ma’am.

2009-01-16T13:08:44-05:00

01.14.09 - Mia was completely off her usual nap schedule, and actually fell asleep on the couch a couple of times today. Very unusual for her! But look at those adorable cheeks and pouty lips! J’adore. 01.15.09 - Mia spent all day arranging and rearranging her tea set (a Christmas gift from Aunt Joslyn), and periodically brought me imaginary tea, which was surprisingly good--airy, with just a hint of mint. B & I also went to see the Knoxville Symphony Orchestra perform Bach, Mozart and Mendelssohn downtown (and it was fantastic--the maestro even gave a shout out to all the bloggers in the audience), and I meant to have my sister get pics of us all dressed up, but yeah, I forgot. Shoots. 01.16.09 - This is me wearing my cold weather sweater because it was 6 degrees when I got up this morning. S I X. And I know that’s nothing for those of you living in more northern climes, but it is not supposed to get that cold in Tennessee. In fact, I think it’s in the rules somewhere—"The temperature shall not drop below 32 degrees Fahrenheit during the winter in the State of Tennessee.” I mean, come on—if I’d wanted cold winters like this, I would’ve stayed in Michigan. Anyways, I pulled out this sweater, which is one of my favorites (I got it in Greece) and I hardly ever get to wear it because it is THICK wool and I can only wear it without sweating in very cold weather. Today qualified.

Sick Days

2009-01-13T15:47:01-05:00

Well, B is going on week four of being sick. Poor guy started out with a cold and a nasty cough that turned into bronchitis, got antibiotics for the bronchitis, but the cough continued, and now he’s lost his voice completely and thinks he has laryngitis. He spent yesterday on the couch, which threw my day for a loop. When the living room doubles as your work-from-home office, having people hanging out in it all day can be seriously detrimental to your productivity. I managed to get some correspondence done, but ended up just blowing off the rest of the day. Luckily, my boss didn’t have anything pressing for me to do yesterday. Anyhow, here are more 365 pics. 01.11.09 - Mia, all dressed up for church, and spinning around in mommy’s office chair--one of her favorite pastimes. 01.12.09 - Morning sun through the tacky lace curtains that were here when we moved in. It’s been so dreary out lately—weeks of dark clouds and rain—that the morning sun through filtering through those horrible curtains was a gift. 01.13.09 - First thing this morning, Mia was begging me for “paint water, Mama!” So I hooked her up and let her paint. I love how focused she is in this pic.

Project 365…ish

2009-01-10T17:22:49-05:00

Hey, there. Remember me? Yeah, once again, blogging got pushed aside for the holidays. I really admire people who have the self-discipline to blog regularly. I really am trying to find a way to organize my time so that blogging is a more regular occurrence for me, but so far, no luck. So, what happened during my absence from my blog? Mia turned 3; we enjoyed a visit from my family (my parents, my brother and his family from MI) over Christmas, and a visit from B’s dad over New Year’s; and most recently (yesterday), I turned 29. Those are the highlights; life as usual happened in between. While evaluating my lack of blogging discipline, I came to the conclusion that I feel far too much pressure to say something witty and clever when I blog. While I have many blog-worthy thoughts rolling around in my head, getting them to come out well in type can sometimes be like pulling teeth. Thus, I just put off blogging altogether. I think I may have found a solution to this, though. Recently a couple of my friends (Jodie and Debbie--that I know of so far) have started participating in Project 365, where you are challenged to take (at least) one picture a day every day for a year. I really love this idea, and I’ve loved looking at their photos. Just simple photos of every day life, and yet—as the saying goes—a picture is worth a thousand words. So, I’ve decided to play along. I figure this solves a couple things for me: 1) If I post photos, I have something to blog about, and I won’t even need to say a lot about them—the idea is for them to speak for themselves. 2) I put my darling camera to work on a regular basis, and thus get myself into the habit of taking photos regularly again. 3) It will help me slow down and appreciate the little things in life more. While I don’t even pretend I’m going to post every single day, hopefully it will at least get me posting once or twice a week with some fun photos for friends & family. That said, here are a handful of pics from the past couple days!

Christmas Shopping? Check!

2008-10-05T17:32:23-05:00

Well, I’m completely finished! With my grandparents’ Christmas gifts, that is. I got an email from Shutterfly Thursday or Friday saying they were offering 30% additional photo books and free shipping on orders of $25 through October 8th, and I just had to jump on that. Every year I like to compile a volume of my favorite Mia layouts over the past year to give to her three sets of grandparents. I hate having to figure out what to give who, so photo books are really the perfect solution for the grandparents, especially since we don’t live near any of them and they don’t get to see her much. It’s a good way to share with them how she’s grown over the past year. Yesterday, I decided I’d better sit down and get the books done before I missed the offer completely. The challenge was that I haven’t scrapped very much at all since the spring, and there were huge gaping chronological holes in between layouts. I did some quick scrapping to fill in the blanks (results below), and got 4 books ordered (one for each set of grandparents, and a master copy for us to keep). Yep. So, yay! That’s pretty much the biggest part of my Christmas shopping, finished. Which is awesome, because I really hate shopping. Ick. I think my shopping gene was accidentally replaced with a video game/computer nerd gene. Oh, well. Click here for credits Click here for credits Click here for credits Click here for credits

Mia, Cinderella and a Magnadoodle

2008-09-30T16:12:02-05:00

Mia had just finished watching Cinderella (she calls it “Cin-brlah"), and wanted me to play it again. I turned the TV off, explained to her that we only watch one movie a day, and that now it was play time. So she ran into her room and brought out her magnadoodle. Pushing it into my lap, she said, “Draw TV!” So I drew a TV and handed it back to her. She immediately pushed it back into my lap and said, “Want Cin-brlah on TV!” So I drew Cinderella (as a stick figure) on the TV. Now she’s staring at her magnadoodle. Oh, my.

I Love When This Happens

2008-09-15T16:49:40-05:00

For some reason, I am always so tickled when Mia goes off to her room to play, and a short time later when I notice that it’s gotten quiet all of a sudden, I go into her room and find her zonked out amidst a scattering of toys. Possibly one of the most adorable things about this little two-year-old.

Server Migration

2008-09-03T03:46:02-05:00

I just wanted to post a quick little notice that I will be taking the site down at some point towards the end of the week in order to switch servers. The site may be down for a day or two. I figured while I was at it, I would give the site’s look and organization a little makeover, so be ready for a new look when we’re back!

Busy Summer

2008-08-19T06:34:00-05:00

Been a while since I posted here! That is because it has been a busy summer, and sometimes it seems like it’s hard to stop and catch my breath! What have I been up to? Let’s see if I can sum it up: The end of June we attended a weekend family regional meeting for Bobby’s work, which was a lot of fun. It was neat to meet other spouses who have been through the tough times of building a business with their husbands (or wives). Talking with them was encouraging, and I got to learn a little more about how the company Bobby works for runs things. We even got to get away as a family one afternoon and go tubing down the Chatahoochee River (did I mention this was in N. Georgia?)! Then we went straight from there to my parents’ house in Michigan, where we spent the week of the 4th of July. Hotdogs and fireworks were had at my uncle’s house on the lake, and we saw the whole fam (well, my dad’s side anyways)! Then, the BIG news of the summer: we moved! I know I mentioned moving in a previous post, and I am happy to report that we got all moved in smoothly. The spiders were pretty determined to hang onto the place, but Bobby finally went out and got whatever insecticide takes care of spiders, and doused the basement, and we’ve been relatively spider-free ever since. Also, my sister moved down from Michigan to rent a room in our basement, so it’s nice to have her here. Of course, she got here just in time for the basement to be torn up. There was some pretty serious water seepage in the basement, and our landlord decided to have a drainage system installed and then have that wall waterproofed (thankfully). So the guys came to rip out that wall and in the process, they discovered rotting wood and termites, which prolonged the work. We’re still waiting for the stairs to be replaced. My web design business has been pretty steady this summer as well, which I’m thankful for. I love designing and developing websites, and the extra source of income is definitely welcome. I also built myself a new blog called Genevieve Says. It’s more editorial than this one, and less scrapbooking-focused. I still plan on posting updates on my life in general and any new scrapbooking layouts, but if you want to read more you can find me over there, too. Of course, all the web designing means I haven’t had as much time for digi-designing or digiscrapping, but I plan on reorganizing my time here shortly so I can get back to those things again. I have scrapped three layouts this summer, and here they are: Click Here for Credits Click Here for Credits Click Here for Credits