Will you please join me in prayer?

For my sweet friend Melissa and her family? My heart is breaking for this precious family.

I went to college with Melissa and her husband Doug but didn't really get to know them until we moved here from New Mexico four years ago. (I think of them often even though last fall, Melissa & Doug moved to a new area for career reasons.) Melissa is the sweetest friend and mom you could ever know. She loves Jesus with all her heart and seriously, I don't think Melissa could ever say a cross word about ANYone. She is so very kind & gentle. In March 2008, Melissa was diagnosed with lymphoma and has fought a very courageous battle against this terrible cancer. Last Monday, she was given some very devastating news. I can't stop thinking about her and what she is going through. I can't begin to imagine how she is feeling right now. She has three adorable children who need her.

If you want to read her words about the news she was given, or to see the rest of her blog, go here.

I have never been more thankful for my health and that of my husband and children.

Please help me pray for a miracle for my friend. She wants to live and will need a miracle to do so. Please pray also for her husband (Doug) and her children (Caleb, Lauren & Audrey).

Remember to hug those you love often - none of us are promised tomorrow. What we are promised though, is that we are never alone and I am so very thankful for that. God hears us when we humble ourselves and call out to Him.

Thank you for your earnest prayers! God is good!

New Additions

For years now, the girls have begged to have a pet cat. They would ask us constantly if we could go to the pet store and visit the pets there. Apparently this was not pet enough for these two animal lovers.

I was a bit resistant about the cat thing just because I figured I would do the bulk of the pet care if we ever got one. (By the way, I was right about that...) On a spur-of-the-moment a couple of Saturdays' ago, Jeremy and I decided we would make their wildest seven and four year old dreams come true. I was VERY apprehensive about this - I spend WAY TOO MUCH time analyzing and over analyzing how each and every decision I ever make will affect every aspect of my life. I know, big surprise for those of you who know me well. Anyway, L&L were positively giddy with happiness.

Unfortunately, they had to wait a few days to enjoy "Kipper" because she absolutely refused to come out of hiding. This is what we saw for about the first four days:

She eventually did venture out into our dangerous and very scary house and realized we were friendly. She has since adjusted beautifully and is patient and playful with the girls. She is not a lap cat but is friendly with us nonetheless. One thing I love about her is how sweet & gentle she is. Oh, and in case you were worried, I have adjusted well too. She is actually a breeze to care for and has added a lot of happiness to our home in recent days. (Amazing how easy a cat is to take care of after you've had babies!)

I love this photo of all of them looking out the window longingly!

Yesterday was "Baby Day" at our church & I was "in charge" of putting things together. Baby Day is to meet & get to know a bit better the babies of the church. It is a yearly happening. I made these scrapbook frames as the gifts the parents would receive. I made 22 of them.

Here are most of them in my kitchen:

And here they are at the church:

My big order is finished. Now I am working on several smaller ones and trying to get my house back in some semblance of order after a rip-roarin' garage sale over the weekend. Not really that great but at least less stuff is present in my house!

Monkey Business

A friend from church is expecting a sweet baby boy very soon so several ladies from church got together last week for a baby shower. Her "theme" for the baby's bedding is green/blue/brown & monkeys. I created this paper bag album for her based on her bedding. I paper pieced this monkey from a drawing I did after looking at her crib blanket.




I also made advice/blessing "tags" for her shower attenders to write a message on. I have done these for several showers in the past - it is becoming a tradition! You may also remember these dolphin shower tags I made several months ago.

The "front" of the tag is decorated & the "back" of the tag is hand stamped with journaling lines.

And, since you all seemed so concerned about the disaster that is often Lindsay's bedroom, this is what else happens when I'm busy with 8+ orders and doing the above pictured goodies...

This is approximately five loads of laundry waiting to be folded. Not too bad in and of itself except, this was just the start of what needed to be washed/dried/folded/put away. (And, I'm still working on it...)

Finally, it was Jeremy's turn (today) to provide a birthday treat for someone he works with. Unfortunately last night, after he mixed the cake batter, he realized that the only cupcake cups we had were festive Christmas Santa ones. We decided that we should add to the festivity with a variety of holiday sprinkles. We tried to include most major seasons/holidays. You will find he was able to create cupcakes for Christmas, fall, Halloween, Easter, spring, Valentine's Day, and July 4th with sprinkles conveniently located right in my very own kitchen cabinet.

P.S. I have 67 of 72 pages done of my big order. I plan on being done by the weekend. Yeah!

Catching up: a hodgepodge of happenings

My blog entries are not nearly as frequent as I would like or plan for them to be SO... I will be using this post to catch up on several topics I have been meaning to post about but just can't seem to find the time. Speaking of time, I have still been incredibly busy - getting about an order a day. Also, I have 57 of 72 pages done on my "huge order". I hope to be completely done with this one by next week sometime and I will be SO HAPPY! I have also been busy keeping up with the housekeeping though of course not up to my neat-freak friends' standards (Kristina and you others). Why do I have so many friends that are neat-freaks and I am so not? What does this mean? What does this say about me? About them?

SOOOO, is this better?


And no, I did not just shove everything in the closet (though my clever children seem to find this method of "cleaning" quite effective).

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Next topic: When Perrys' Met Sally. Several weeks ago, Laura's first grade class made muppets. First they studied all about Jim Henson and the muppets. Then they all made their own muppet characters. This was too cute! I got to see several of the muppets when I went for Laura's parent teacher conference. Laura created a horse named Sally and wrote a story to go along with it. She was SO EXCITED for us to meet Sally. So far, she says this was her favorite thing about first grade.

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Next topic: A blessed day - January, 25, 2009. Jeremy and I were so proud of Laura's decision to be baptized. She attended classes at church to learn more about baptism and it's significance in her life. She has expressed an interest in being baptized for quite some time and it was truly a joyous occasion for our family to watch her interest turn into reality. I am so thankful that she has chosen early in her life to follow Jesus. I pray that she will always seek Him no matter what her circumstances may be. She read a statement in front of everyone about her decision to be baptized and what it meant to her. I wanted to put it on here but I can't find it at the moment. It was great though - she really thought about it and took the initiative to write it out all by herself. I was so proud of her!

Unfortunately my photos are not very good because my camera battery was dead unbeknown st to me until I got to church. These photos are just "stills" from our video camera. Hopefully you'll get the idea though...

Okay, I'm getting REALLY annoyed because the photos are apparently on our laptop. Since they are not great photos anyway, I'm just going to forget it. Picture a beautiful girl being baptized in a pink shirt!!!!!!!

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Next topic: Worms! My four year old little girly girl LOVES to dig in the dirt. Loves to find worms and keep them captive in her sand box buckets. She also LOVES to wear dresses. I just think these photos are cute. She's the perfect combination of girly girl & tomboy! : ) I don't love worms but I DO love these two girls!

Ahhhh, the smell of big, pink, wet worms in spring...

I suppose that's an adequate amount of catching up for now. More soon...

He is Risen!

Hope everyone had a wonderful Easter! We certainly did. Here are a few photos of the busy weekend...

First, our church's annual "Egg"stravaganza:

Dyeing eggs:

My attempts at getting cute photos of the girls in their Easter dresses:

Needless to say, I got no adorable Easter dress photos. Oh well!

For anyone keeping track, I now have 44 pages of 72 done on my "big order". I also have about six or seven other orders for albums - LOTS of albums plus two shower gifts I'm working on. Business has been good but I'm certainly feeling the pressure. I can only do one job full-time - either housekeeping or working on my scrapbooking orders. I already have the other full-time job of taking care of my family. Anybody got any great suggestions for how to manage it all at once???

When I'm busy working on orders and not keeping track of what my children (Lindsay in this case) are doing, this is what happens:

I need some serious HELP around here!

Do not be alarmed if you don't hear from me. I'm either working on scrapbook pages for people (certainly not my own - everyone else will have nice scrapbooks of their children except me). Or, I have drowned in a sea of dress up clothes and dollhouse furniture.

Circus, circus

We had SUCH A FUN weekend with my parents, sister & brother-in-law, and my nieces! It was so nice to spend some time relaxing, shopping & laughing. Laura & Lindsay had a BLAST at Aunt Beth & Uncle Dave's house which will now be known as Kid Heaven. They LOVED spending time with cousins Karilyn & Heidi!

On Saturday, we all (sans Grandpa 'cause he was working) went to the Shrine Circus. The kids really had fun. Well, sort of. Laura and Karilyn enjoyed it, Lindsay got hot and irritable and went outside to hang out with Daddy for the second half. Heidi slept through most of the second half. They did enjoy going for a pony ride except Heidi who would sooner have her hair pulled out one strand at a time than sit on a pony. According to Laura, riding the pony was her favorite part of the circus and "it was well worth the money". (She paid?) Thanks Uncle Dave for taking us to the circus!

My photos didn't turn out too well - it was dark inside the Civic Center but here are a few...

One of my highlights of the weekend was going to the paper store and filling two huge boxes & a bag with cardstock I will now use and hoard for scrapbooking. (They sell paper by the pound & it's really cheap!) I LOVE going there. I LOVE paper! But now, where, oh where will I put you, you glorious paper???

Now the only bad news of the weekend. I didn't work. I actually took time off (Gasp!) and tried not to think about all I had to do. Now I am feeling behind and overwhelmed and unmotivated. I did finish one of my custom paper bag albums yesterday. Here are some photos:

Next up (I am writing this here so I don't forget!): Laura's baptism photos, Worms, & When Perrys' Met Sally. Next time you hear from me, I better have done some work.

Working, working, working

I've been super busy work-wise lately. I mentioned a couple posts ago about the HUGE custom order I am doing right now. I have 15 of 72 pages done. Slowly but surely...

I am working on a bunch of other projects right now also. I thought I would share photos of a few I finished last weekend. The first is an ABC chipboard album for my friend's baby - I gave it to her for her first birthday. The second is a bridal shower paper bag album that was a custom order. It was done in the same colors/theme as her wedding invitation. It has kind of a "tropical" feel to it because the wedding will be in Florida. It had mats for photos, places to write the gift list and included 16 page tags for guests of the shower to write a personal message to the bride. Finally, a photo of another of the layouts from the "huge order".

Laura starts her Spring Break tomorrow. We are pretty excited! While she is off next week, we are going to do some cleaning. She has become a little pack rat in her room lately. I am also planning to work on some fun projects with them. I am hoping to finish a "pets" paper bag album. Their only pet at this time is a goldfish but I'm pretty excited about the album we're going to make. I'll keep you posted on how that goes...

We are headed to Canton for the weekend to spend time with family. The girls CAN'T WAIT to see their grandparents & cousins!