This little darling is one today. As a mom I have to look back and think about his sweet birth day.

He doesn’t even know today is any different from any other even though we’ve sang to him, let him eat lots of cookies and wished him Happy Birthday the minute he woke up.

He just prefers to eat sticks. What he really wants is to clobber my camera. That is why he has a tear on his cheek. Poor guy.

He’s walking so well for a little one year old but he really likes to crawl because he’s so darn fast. Come and get me, cute boy.

This old dog was a great help in getting Sam’s picture taken. I have him sit by me and he gets Sam’s attention. Sam likes Chopper more than he likes me.

And just for fun… my cute lady hens. Whom Sam also loves. He sits at the fence and lets them pick at his fingers. Brave boy.

Thank you for the eggs, girls. (When I gather eggs I always try to tell them thank you. I certainly wouldn’t want to lay an egg everyday.)

This week I was able to have a little climbing trip down to my favorite place, Maple Canyon. This canyon is only an hour and half away from me and I hope to frequent this climbing heaven throughout the summer a little bit more.

You see, I have been training very hard this past year. I’ve been going to the climbing gym twice a week. I’ve learned a lot more about technique, how to gain more power and strength and how to save energy in your arms and hands on the hard climbs. I want to try my new skills on the great outdoors. Also a new climbing guide book was published last year for Maple and I finally got my hands on a copy. This book opens up so many wonderful climbing areas within the canyon that I didn’t know about it. Huzzah! Anyone up for a trip?

Monday was the planned day for our little climbing day trip. It rained and poured all weekend and so I was a bit nervous about it working out but the weather app promised it would clear up on time. Monday morning I woke up to wet, wet, wet. But my good climbing friend, Janaan, is just as crazy as me so we threw the kiddos in the car and headed down anyway. The sky did lighten up but there was a very teeny tiny drizzle for most of the morning and the weather stayed a bit chilly. We bundled the kids up and hiked up to the perfect location for a rainy day. The Pipe Dream cave is humongous and kept us dry all day long.The rain created little waterfalls running down both sides of the cliff. It was amazing.

The climbing was fabulous. Most of the grades at this crag are very difficult. With the help of some climbing friends I was able to try out some very challenging climbs although I only have pics of Janaan climbing. Nice under cling, girl! Don’t let the rock deceive you, it’s harder than it looks.

The kids had plenty to entertain them while we climbed.

There was a little tree swing.

We had a birthday party piñata because 3 of our friends were celebrating their birthdays. How cool to have a pinata smashing party at the climbing wall? The kids loved it and filled their pockets with a ton of candy. After that we had no problem keeping them happy.

And we even set them up a great big rope swing. But we had to show them how to do it first.

Leah was still a little nervous about it so she and I hooked up together.

Then she was brave enough to do it herself. Wee!

Ah, what a lovely day it was! I’m already dreaming about our next trip.

Memorial day weekend, anyone?

When I get my baby down for a nap I’m faced with the daily question of what to do with my time. Should I have a rest myself? Should I get busy cleaning up? Do dishes, laundry, scrub bathrooms, organize drawers and closets? Can I put off the garden any longer? Do I catch up on Pinterest, Instagram, Joss and Main, or my new favorite feed reader Feedly (did you know google reader is closing down)? Will I ever finish the latest book I’m reading? Should I get some scrapbooking time in, work on my shop, or blog about my mundane exciting life? Should I bust out some paper and paint and have a creative session with Leah? (She’d love that wouldn’t she!)

What would you pick?

Here is my little darling making cookies with me. You see how happy she is? Shouldn’t this always be my choice?

I wont tell you what usually wins though (chances are you know because you’re faced with similar questions yourself) but every day is a little different. Sometimes I’ll tackle the laundry or join Leah for a rousing game of Batabanga, or plop down on the couch exhausted. But today I’m giving myself some computer time. Leah is gone at a friend’s, the kitchen is mildly clean and the laundry is calling my name but my dear little blog is sadly neglected.

So, hello dear blog. Would you like to know what I’ve been up to?

I have a new little hobby. It’s Slacklining. Have you heard of it? I think it’s surprisingly fun. It’s kinda of nerdy- like an outdoorsie kind of nerdy. It’s good for your core and obviously for balance too. You might have seen people at the park doing it and thought they were tightrope walking. It’s different though because the line has slack in it and bounces up and down unlike a true tightrope. The kids love it and we’ve set it up at home and at the park.

Next up, we had a lovely little family picnic at one of my favorite rock climbing spots. The weather has been absolutely divine and so when there is a chance to be outdoors, we are there.

We had such a good time but Emma seems to be approaching some preteen moodiness stage. It’s getting to be a bit of a pain. We even let her bring along a friend to help lift her mood. But none the less she was determined to have a bad time.

Any recommendations for handling moody girls?

Here are my cute boys. Sam was determined to explore our fire pit and wanted to crawl around in the dirt any chance he could get.

This kid has become even more busy than ever. He is making good progress on his walking. He can make it across a room if he is really determined. Monday night at the park he had so much fun exploring the baseball field.

Stop eating dirt, my son!

That’s it for now. Nap time only lasts so long. Next time I get a chance to sit down, I’ll do some templates and pages.

Later.

April treated me very well but I’m still happy to see May here. Despite our typical spring weather being up and down, (snow one day and 70 degrees the next) the world around me is greening up, the sun is out and feeling divine as is shines down on my face. More walks to the park will be happening and if I can swing it, I’ll even be getting some climbing time on the rocks outside tomorrow!

Hurray. Hurray.

Here are some pics to show you what I’ve been up to. (Sorry for the repeat if you are following me on Instagram.)

MS Walk:

Mountain biking with my hunny:

Biking with my Baby (not on the mountain):

Painting rock pets with Emma:

Taking care of this little guy:

Going to the park with this little guy:

And cheering on this little guy’s first steps:

Ha, ha! It feels like a lot of time is spent with my “little guy.”

I’ve been suffering from a repeating clogged mild duct. Luckily there is no infection yet. I’ll work it out and then a few days later it will come back. I get them in the same spot, same side, each time. Usually the clog is in my nipple and then it backs up the whole bottom half. Ouchy, they hurt. They make me grouchy. Have any of you suffered from these over and over again. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong. Is it Sam’s position? Am I not getting enough sleep?

I’m going to get the hot pad and lay down until Sam wakes up from his nap.

Oh no, he just woke up.

ps. I bought these jeans. I’m not sure if I should have buyers regret or not. Am I too old for printed pants?

Later.

But before I do that I’m going to put my newest template up for grabs. Snag it here for free until I put it in my shop.

For some reason I always love these wonky little pieces of paper on a template. I think they add character and allow you to use a bunch of fun patterned papers without getting too messy.

My scalloped banner is for inspiration for placement of your own elements or banner but I actually ended up using it. I warn you that the string is in no way professionally created and barely even resembles a string if you look closely. So with that disclaimer, I’ll also tell you that the scallops are all on one layer so it was a little tricky to get multiple patterns on it. For a tip, if you decide to use it, use your marquee tool to “cut” out little pieces of paper and then drag them on to the template and group them all together onto the banner. Does that make sense? You can have 7 little pieces of paper all grouped together on one layer. Let me know if you have any questions.

Here are my pages for some inspiration.

And because I liked this template so much I went ahead an made a few more in the same style. This Add-On kit is in my shop here. It will be 50% off through May 1st so save a buck while you can.

More pages scrapped makes one happy mommy. Yea for making a small dent in my pictures! I can’t wait to print these out.

That’s all for now. Thanks for stopping by.

It certainly makes for a busy week.

First off, this little darling turned 4. I love thinking about the day Leah came to us. Her birth is such a fun memory. Do you remember it? It’s my favorite birth so far. I have to say I’m famous around these parts for having my baby on a shower curtain. Hah!

Here’s my little frosting face.

Hasn’t she grown up to be such a darling girl? But then again, I’m biased.

Ah, green eyes.

We had a cupcake bash with her rowdy sweet friends.

I love how the boys are so excited for her to blow out her candles. They boy in the blue stripped shirt is helping her blow. Hah.

Yum, cupcakes!

We made marshmallow towers for an activity. They were, of course, eaten afterwards. It was so nice to have all the kids sitting down for a quiet minute at the table.

Then this big guy turned 7. I had posted this pic on Instagram. He had said, “I’ll show you how to blow a candle out sideways.” Funny. I’m not sure where that came from but we had a good laugh about it.

I’m afraid to admit that I procrastinated planning these birthday parties out. It’s kind of how we roll here at our house. So after I had thrown Leah’s party together there was a bit of a rush to get Isaac’s done. The timing was a little crazy and a bit of a mess so I, feeling a little overwhelmed by it all, turned Isaac’s whole shindig over to Jeremy.

However, it was hard to relinquish the control… especially when it came to Isaac’s birthday invitation. Jeremy spent some time making them, trying to figure out how to make them look nice in Powerpoint or some other program. I could hardly look when he brought them to show me. They were so tiny and illegible, let alone the goofy pictures. Should I really let him pass these out? I almost died that day from rolling my eyes too much. But I swallowed my pride and allowed it, knowing that it was one less thing I had to do.

Afterwards, I had a good laugh with some parents who had a child attend both Leah’s and Isaac’s party. It was obvious to them who had made which birthday invitation. I show them here for memory sake. It’s not that I’m overly proud of mine but from a design perspective the difference between them is hilarious.

Don’t laugh too hard.

Leah’s:

Isaac’s:

I did make cupcakes for my sweet boy. (Which was more than Isaac got the year Leah was born.) Then Jeremy took the party to the swimming pool. I didn’t even go because I was being such a party pooper. So I have very few photos to show compared to Leah’s party.

No, I do not have favorites.

These boys had a blast. They got water guns for favors. Talk about easy.

Boys, boys, boys.

Our birthday week is over (huzzah!) and my sweet darlings are one year older. Sigh.

Anyway, on to what you’ve been waiting for. Template 103 can be snagged here for a limited time before it goes into my shop.

And here are my pages. They kind of resemble the project life pages we are seeing so often around digiscrap town. I quite like the style, even though I’ll never do a project life, because I can get all the photos I need on a two page spread. Yea! My favorite!

I’m a little shy of 2 years behind in my scrapbooking. I’m still plunking away at 2011. I was surprise how young my kiddos looked to me in these pics, especially Leah and Emma. I guess time does fly by.

Happy scrapbooking.

Well, I got it. Jeremy took a couple days off during the kid’s spring break and we headed down south to Zion National Park. LOVED IT! Here are some highlights of our little getaway. (Beware- picture overload!)

We hike to the Emerald Pools. Only one out of 3 were actually emerald in color.

We hid in cool holes.

Leah slipped into the Emerald Pool (literally.) Everyone wondered why she was wearing a jacket on such a nice day. It took hours for her to warm up.

Sammy slept through each hike. (You perfect child!)

We (meaning Jeremy and Emma) caught lots of blue-bellied lizards.

We walked up to The Narrows. The water was too cold for walking up any further. (Frowny face.)

Took pictures of my cute Boys.

Played with way too friendly squirrels.

Got lost in slot canyons trying to find a trail head.

We finally found our trail, Many Pools, and braved murky waters after much screaming (screamers will remain unnamed) and explored some awesome small scale slots.

Leah got scratched up and wanted to show it off.

The kids (and Jeremy) swam at the hotel pool every chance they got.

And we checked out the Dinosaur Museum in St George. (Which I’m telling you about because I loved it despite its small size. Cool stuff, I tell you, if you’re a little bit of a science nerd. Check it out if you’re around.)

So that’s a rap. Did you make it through all my photos? Give yourself a pat on the back.

We’re back to the daily grind. BOO HOO! How about you? Did you get to sneak away for a much needed spring break?