I’ve been really slow this whole week. Operating well below capacity. I am guessing it’s cause my body, mind, and creative self all need rest after the last few weeks of constant work work work. I spent a lot of last night and this morning journaling and doing art for soul restoration. These classes are truly amazing for me right now. Even Misty’s class where I am not doing the art work, I am doing the journaling and it’s shifting things for me. Each page of journaling has been a revelation, an advice, a shift. It’s quite astounding and such a gift. I’ve been working on forgiveness a lot too. Especially forgiving myself. I am often hardest on myself.
I noticed today that now more than ever I’ve been working on myself. With the exercise and food, I’m working on my body, and with the classes and journaling I’m working on my soul and my creative self. I’m really trying to stretch, grow, forgive, let go. So far, so good for January. Making progress in a way that feels good. Feels rewarding. Feels new.
About 48 hours before I leave for LA. Trying to enjoy every moment with my little ones. Nathaniel’s been playing and quietly exploring. He says more and more words each day.
He knows which remote is for which machine and grabs the right one depending on his requests. Quite amazing how my kids will not even know the concept of having to wait until a certain time to watch a program. They get to grow up with DVR.
I asked David for a photo but Blue’s Clues was more enticing.
And then he laughed at me but I got to snap one in the meantime.
Nathaniel watching TV while sucking his thumb and holding his blanket. David writing his gratitudes.
Look at those toes! Oh the amount of noise I had to make to get him to look at me.
Tonight’s date night! I already did my portrait to ensure it wouldn’t crowd my mind and we could have a good time together. Some fun movie. Even though we don’t get to go out until later than usual, I am really looking forward to time with just us and going out and being at the movies. All things I love.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that I am going to LA in two days, I am looking forward to seeing some good friends.
2. I am grateful for date night!
3. I am grateful for my kids. Today, for a few minutes, Nathaniel sat in front of me and ate some grapes with me. I got to smell his neck and hair and give him tons of kisses. I love him so deeply and really really feel blessed to get to kiss him so much.
Three Things David’s Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that my birthday is coming up {* his pick for the journal}
2. I am grateful that I got two new games for the phone.
3. I am grateful that Daddy’s home! (Aren’t we all? we love it when daddy comes.)
I was saving this CHA layout for after the show but since Margie shared this one on her blog, I am assuming it’s ok to share. This is one of The Girls’ Paperie work I made for the show.
Journaling Reads:
This year, more than any other, I am ready to embrace my word. I am ready to let go of my past. My ideas of who I can be and who I am and embrace a free and open future. Ready to be anything I choose. Anything I wish. Ready to fly free. 2011.
All products are from The Girls’ Paperie Vintage Whimsy or Mix and Match lines.
Details:
The Imperfectionists is a short story collection where all the stories are linked. They are all about different individuals working at the same newspaper. I don’t usually pick short-story collections but I’ve loved some over the years and they’ve consistently been the ones where the stories were linked somehow.
I tried to read this on my own a while back but didn’t really get into it. And then it was the book club pick for February so I read it anyway. And I really enjoyed it. Some stories more than others but overall I really liked the book. The characters are interesting and the stories are, too.
Recommended.
I honestly cannot even remember this morning. I took David to the bus, came home and then rushed back out to the TMJ doctor. Then I came back and did work, put Nathaniel down, exercised, did work. Nothing interesting.
I got my third lesson for Soul Restoration and I have to say each week I’ve been trying to play with paint, do textures etc but I always end up scrapping those. I dislike what I did. I feel inadequate like it’s a mishmash of crap. I cannot seem to turn off the conversations in my head. Which is why I go back to fabric or paper. Seems safer, less messy, harder to screw up. I look at her painting (and others’) with awe and wish I could do it too. And yet, I seem to be missing that gene.
The little boy spent some time looking through my soul restoration journal today.
I think he liked what he saw.
Then he played with his beloved stickers.
And let me take a nice photo.
So did David, one nice one…
Before all the crazy, silly, fun ones.
Tonight’s a lot of journaling. I find the journaling is really, really helping me so I am going to do more and more of it until it becomes more second nature, more something I’m making the time for. And then if I have time leftover, I will do my soul restoration art work.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that I am taking the time to journal and do my homework. I am learning a lot about myself and really appreciating these classes so much.
2. I am grateful that I am finally seeing a doctor about my TMJ and getting some help and things are improving. Really grateful for that.
3. I am grateful for the quiet week I’m having. This week is low on commitment and engagements. It’s giving me time to rest and recuperate.
Three Things David’s Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that I got stamp with a dog on it at school {* his pick for the journal}
2. I am grateful that I played on the phone.
3. I am grateful that wilfin gave me a pencil
Today’s page was week two’s homework for the Soul Restoration class.
This is a representation of the timeline of my life. I will be turning 37 this year and this goes up to 40. Each row is 10 years. There are many sentences and markers. Black is for the hardest times in my life. Grays are for the not-so-great times. Colors mixed with gray are times when there was a mixture of really good and not so great. And the textured wallpaper one is for times when it was overall good but had some roughness day-to-day. Reds are love and children. That’s about it. It all means stuff to me of course but no need to explain step by step since it would be meaningless to most people here.
However, I wanted to talk about some of the interesting things that came up for me when I did this exercise:
1. If you look carefully, you’ll notice that the “really bad stuff” is less than 10% of my life. I am blessed to have never really suffered to anything terrible in my life. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had my share of sorrows, shitty friends, broken hearts, rejections, etc. When I was little, my parents got divorced and I took it quite hard. But, they got back together and remarried each other and are married to the day. Wonderfully, I might add. I’ve never lost anyone to a grave illness or really even out of order. I’ve lost my paternal grandfather very young but he passed before I was born. My maternal grandfather died younger than he should have but he wasn’t young. My paternal grandmother just died last year at the age of 92. She was probably the closest person to me who died. I’ve been blessed to never suffer from real abuse of any kind (small case here, i’ll admit but I’ll talk more about this later.) I’ve never been assaulted, robbed, in debt, homeless, hungry. I’ve never suffered from a grave illness or had a close family member who did. I’ve never had to truly hide my identity or beliefs. As I mentioned, I’ve had rougher moments and I’ve worked really really hard in my life, but I’ve also been truly lucky and blessed. And yet, I often live my life like I’ve survived a tragedy. I feel a bit broken inside. I have abandonment issues. I feel undeserving and not enough. I am insecure. I worry constantly about losing my kids, husband, job, anything really. And yet, I have no reason to. Life’s been wonderful to me, and it’s time I start being grateful for it. It’s time I shed the victim mentality. This page shows it to me in black and white. I have much so much to be grateful for. Time to wake up.
2. I’ve also noticed that most of the “bad things” are things I’ve dragged on longer than they needed to. If you look at the last 25 years of my life, the first black is a relationship that wasn’t working and yet I simply wouldn’t walk away. I refused to let it go and I waited until it reached a breaking point. The second one is TFA where I drained every single bit of myself before I let myself walk away. Both of these times could have been at a minimum lighter gray. And yet I pushed the situation until it reached a bad point. I can stop myself from doing that next time by recognizing that I have a tendency not to admit defeat when a situation is obviously bad for me. Defeat is not always bad. Sometimes it’s better to walk away.
3. The last bad thing that happened to me “without my control” was over 25 years ago. The last really gray time was 20 years ago. I need to stop clinging to those things. It’s been a long time and it’s ok to let it go now. I have friends now. People like me and people love me. I can stop clinging to that time and the sadness that surrounded me then. I can be happy now. It’s ok to let it go. It’s ok.
4. I tend to go through periods of flurry of activity and often times even the good periods come with some rough moments. This is expected and normal. The rough times last a lot shorter than they seem.
5. There are rougher times that are there for a reason. Four years ago, I worked really really hard for two years. I mean really long days, for a long time. But it paid off, it’s how I was able to establish the trust and groundwork that led me to be able to work from home now. That’s when I was putting the seeds in so that I could collect them now. Just like I am doing it with exercise now. Working really hard so I can reap the benefits later.
6. I am most definitely in the golden period of my life. I feel more like I’m thriving than I ever felt. I feel more in my element than I’ve ever felt. It’s time to celebrate that and push it even further. Time to use that strength to let the past rest. Give myself permission to let it go and to know that if I lay all this burden down, things will be ok. It is no doubt that rougher times will come. These things are cyclical for sure. So I might as well truly enjoy these moments. Appreciate them, make the most of them. And when the rougher times come, remember to make sure I don’t drag them out and make them worse than they need to be.
I have a lot more thoughts that came up this week. I hope to write about them more but these ones were all directly tied to the timeline art. Isn’t it amazing how much you can realize about your life with one piece of art?
Details:
Weekly Art Journal is a weekly project for 2011. You can read more about it here.
Lovely start of mostly rest and journaling this morning. Nathaniel decided that 3am was a great wake up time and he was beside himself. I tried to calm him down and finally once Jake was up for the day (4am) I took him to our bed. It took him another 45 minutes to calm down and fall back asleep. At six am the alarm went off and while he slept peacefully for another hour I made David’s lunch, breakfast, and read to him. So I decided taking it easy the rest of the morning was ok for Mommy. I then worked while Nathaniel sat in his bed and didn’t nap. Finally I gave up, I took him out, exercised, gave him lunch and put him back down and went back to work. Late nap meant I had to wake him up to go get David. And so he was cranky. But that’s just how some days roll here.
When we came back home, I finally snapped some photos.
My handsome boy.
And the super-sweet one.
Who has my heart wrapped around his finger.
And then we read more while David ate his veggies. After that he was allowed to play on the phone.
And Nathaniel got his own phone and walked around in circles while the phone played music. Laughing all the while..
And I spent some time making truth cards.
Now the kids are eating and I am reviewing my May class at BPC. We will be rerunning the Telling Stories Deeply class. So if you’ve been wanting to take it, it’s coming up. Likely for the last time I’m guessing. Then I have some posts to write, some more truth cards to make, and my portrait to draw of course. After I finish all that, I get to reward myself with some Misty Mawn videos.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that I finally did some truth cards. I don’t know why I am overcomplicating them so much. I keep thinking they need to be pieces of art. They just need to be done. The point is the message, not the art.
2. I am grateful that I actually made it through the day without a lot of pain. I was worried that a night of so little sleep would mean a terrible day. It wasn’t so, thankfully.
3. I am grateful for my husband. He is so incredibly nice to me on so many levels and helps with the kids so much and he is my best friend. And I am a lucky lucky lucky girl.
Three Things David’s Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that I got a Pokeman book from the library {* his pick for the journal}
2. I am grateful that I played on the phone.
3. I am grateful that i read my book at school and my friends sat with me while i read
This is a Maya Road layout for CHA. All products are Maya Road except the little letters from Making Memories.
Journaling Reads:
My wonderful son, you are going to be six in a month and I am continually amazed by how incredible you are. You read so well and you’re kind and loving with your brother and patient and generous with me and you love to play with legos ad use your imagination. I have no idea what I did to deserve you but I am so grateful and I cannot wait to have another year together.
Details:
I started the morning by preparing my February newsletter and digital downloads. Here’s where I tell you once again, you can sign up for my newsletter on the right side of my blog. You get one email on the first of the month with exclusive free downloads. That’s it.
While I worked, Nathaniel played with a recent obsession. This monitor isn’t hooked up on the other side which means when you turn it on, it just beeps. nonstop. Makes you want to cry pretty much immediately. But, alas, the little boy loves it. Ugh.
Then I setup our family shoot. Which I tested and went through all of these. Me with the clicker, Nathaniel wanting it, and going all drama when he can’t have it and finally grabbing it and happy. Yep, happens each time.
Then started the family fun.
A ton of laughter.
I love these shots.
Then Jake went biking with David (which didn’t go so well).
And Nathaniel was very upset about being left behind.
David’s school is having 100th day on February 2nd and we’re supposed to do a collection. David suggested we punch butterflies. So we did and it turned out quite wonderful.
And when Jake came back home, he played with Nathaniel and the stickers while I scrapped.
After I was done, we had family night where we played a dino math board game. It was a lot of fun despite Nathaniel’s multiple breakdowns. And then the kids went to bed and I did some drawing and photo processing. The plan for tonight is more drawing and then replying to emails cause I still haven’t done that. I am pathetic, I know.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that it was a calming and productive weekend. A lot of revelations. Some art. Some scrapping. A lot of family time and exercising and reading. Just perfect. Especially since the next three weekends promise to be too hectic.
2. I am grateful for family night. I always have so much fun and enjoy my family so much.
3. I am grateful for a short week this week. I will try to work extra hard because I am leaving for LA on Friday and I want to get a ton of work done before I leave.
Three Things David’s Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that mommy got some new games for the phone {* his pick for the journal}
2. I am grateful for family night.
3. I am grateful that we did the butterflies.
Ordinarily I’d post one download a month but I’ve already posted these at Write.Click.Scrapbook so I wanted to make sure if you read my blog and not there you still can get them all so I will be posting several downloads this week. First a 2011 calendar:
You can download it by clicking here.
I hope you enjoy them! You are welcome to play with these as much as you want and use them anywhere you’d like. You are NOT allowed to sell them ever. You don’t have to but I’d appreciate a link back if you do use them.
These were originally posted at writeclickscrapbook.com
David says:
I like this book because the mouse rides the motorcycle and that’s funny and cool. My favorite part was at the end when Keith gave Ralph his motorcycle to keep.
What I didn’t like was that Ralph broke his promise to Keith and ended up losing the motorcycle. I really liked it when they found the motorcycle and gave it back to Keith. (and they found the ambulance too!)
I liked the part where Ralph tricked the dog and made him bark so he could go downstairs. And I really liked when Ralph gave Keith the aspirin.
My least favorite part was when the teachers trapped him under the cup and then put him on the vines outside. And the best part was when Keith brought all of them room service, cause that’s so nice!
Reading a book a week with my six-year-old son David is a weekly project for 2011. You can read more about it here.
I finally took the time to reply to comments. If you’re still waiting for a reply, please let me know and I am so sorry. The day went by too fast and I accomplished way too little. But I did exercise, finish my book, read to david, and scrap a page. I also went shopping briefly. It still felt like I wasted most of the day.
We did take some family shots. I wanted to change the location just to try out new parts of the house. As I set up the tripod, Nathaniel got ready, too.
Then I snapped one of the three of us. And then I realized the aperture was too open.
But not before I caught this one of David. Love it.
Everyone was in a tickling and happy mood so we laughed and laughed.
David laughed.
And so did Nathaniel.
I love these shots. Love all the laughter in all of them. Love that we’re having fun with the whole thing.
Plans for tonight involve getting some blog posts together, drawing a portrait, journaling, and maybe some more truth cards. Oh and replying to email. Yes, that’s the plan. Let’s see how far I get.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that I finished another layout. It wasn’t due until March but I like being able to get things off my plate because I know that new things always come on.
2. I am grateful that I went shopping. Between the shoes and today’s shopping, I got a bunch of what was on my list for weeks done.
3. I am grateful for music today. I listened to music while I exercised today and it made all the difference in the world.
Three Things David’s Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that I played with the lights daddy gave me – they’re magnetic LED lights {* his pick for the journal}
2. I am grateful that I played wii.
3. I am grateful that I played with the computer.
jake
Second week back to work and Jake’s still doing great. Relaxed and optimistic. I love seeing Jake at his best. He’s such a joy to have around. So wise, calm, kind. He’s making quite a collection of friends in the area as well. Another thing he’s great at. I’m so thankful for him.
karen
I am finally done with the CHA work. That’s basically occupied most of my moments since the year started. I finished all my layouts, I photographed everything and I am now ready. One week before I get to fly out and see all my work in person. I am sad about leaving the kids but excited to go. Now I can play catch up on everything else I’ve been dropping on the floor.
david
David’s been moodier than usual this week. He can be ver pessimistic and difficult sometimes but then just when I worry, his wonderful, happy self comes out and wins me all over again. I’ve decided I need to work on the way I talk to him. Sometimes I get impatient and say meaner things than I ever intend to, just to get his attention. I don’t want to threaten him or punish him unless he’s truly being unkind. So I need to find other ways to communicate and I need to learn to be more patient with him. He’s just six after all.
nathaniel
Nathaniel’s had a good week for the most part. He’s talking more and more and he’s definitely a lot more sure about what he wants and finds creative ways to communicate it. He was grabbing my fingers to point at things all week. He went to his first dentist appointment this week. He was too sad and wiggly to get any cleaning but he got a clean bill of health so far. He’s still into the Thomas but he’s getting more patient about letting me watch my own thing sometimes. He is so cute and loves his brother so much and imitates him all the time. He’s also still carrying the blanket around everywhere. He’s lucky he’s so cute because we let him do anything.
and here’s the card version:
Us Right Now is a weekly project for 2011. You can read more about it here.
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projects for twenty twenty-six
projects for twenty twenty-five
projects for twenty twenty-four
projects for twenty twenty-three
projects for twenty twenty-two
projects for twenty twenty-one
projects for twenty nineteen
projects for twenty eighteen
projects from twenty seventeen
monthly projects from previous years
some of my previous projects
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