One Solitary Life

He was born in an obscure village
The child of a peasant woman
He grew up in another obscure village
Where he worked in a carpenter shop
Until he was thirty

He never wrote a book
He never held an office
He never went to college
He never visited a big city
He never travelled more than two hundred miles
From the place where he was born
He did none of the things
Usually associated with greatness
He had no credentials but himself

He was only thirty three
His friends ran away
One of them denied him
He was turned over to his enemies
And went through the mockery of a trial
He was nailed to a cross between two thieves
While dying, his executioners gambled for his clothing
The only property he had on earth

When he was dead
He was laid in a borrowed grave
Through the pity of a friend

Nineteen centuries have come and gone
And today Jesus is the central figure of the human race
And the leader of mankind's progress
All the armies that have ever marched
All the navies that have ever sailed
All the parliaments that have ever sat
All the kings that ever reigned put together
Have not affected the life of mankind on earth
As powerfully as that one solitary life


Dr. James Allan Francis

Odds and Ends

Not much to share right now. Life is fairly quiet ... just the way we like it.

Matthew and Spencer both got their first progress reports from high school. Both are having great semesters so far. Spencer is really enjoying high school. I think he was very nervous in August, but he tells me that it's great. His marks sure show it! Matt pretty much anxiety free right now. We have some fleeting moments, but they are few and far between.

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Cameron seems much happier at school this year. His teacher seems great together we are trying to give him the extra help he needs. He's very happy right now because in school he's building a bridge. The teacher says that he's doing an amazing job on it ... I'm not surprised. That's right up his alley.

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I'm finally getting to Cameron's room. I've got the walls painted. This weekend I'm doing the trim and ceiling. It looks fantastic right now. I love the colour ... like a milk chocolate colour. I told him that I'm moving in with him.

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Today we have to go to Ikea to see about getting Cameron some new furniture. I wonder what else we'll come home with!

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Tonight I'm going to friends' anniversary bash. It's a semi-formal event so I get to actually dress up like a girl for a change! I don't think I have anything to wear, so I need to go shopping for that today too.

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I don't miss hockey at all. I thought I would, but I don't. Both Cameron and Spencer decided to play badminton instead this winter. It's much easier on my sleeping schedule!

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How's everyone doing on the photo challenge? I know that David and Jennifer have both got their pictures on their blogs. I will link to those at the end of the month. I'm still looking for my photo ops. My camera is in the car just waiting for it. If it's not raining tomorrow I my take the boys to the pumpkin patch and see what I can come up with.

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Life is good!

My Thursday Thirteen

Thirteen Childhood memories 1…. I remember when my brother, Stephen, put his arm through the washing machine wringer. We were both very little. I remember him screeming and seeing a pair of legs running by the basement window outside. (I don't know who that was because my mother was in the house.) The next thing I remember from that day is seeing my mom and Stephen being wisked away in a neighbour's car to the hospital. 2.I remember a few days before school started, my dad took me out in the car and dropped me off near the school to make sure I knew how to get home. 3. I remember my first day of kindergarten and the coat cubbies. 4. I remember being late a lot for school. One day I was late I sat in the classroom alone because I didn't know where anyone was and the custodian saw me and took me to the gymnasium where an assembly was happening. 5. I remember one day I thought I was late for kindergarden. When I arrived at the school I was crying and I went in, only to find out that I was very early for school. 6. I remember my grade one teacher, Miss Waters. On the first day of school she came into the classroom doing the tongue flutter thing and then spending a part of the morning teaching the class how to do it. 7. I remember my best friends in grade one. They were twin boys and I used to go to their house after school sometimes to play. 8. I remember a girl in kindergarden who thought everything was hers. One day I wore a pearl necklace to school and during story time I egged her on and showed her my necklace and said "It's mine." She got mad and pulled on the necklace and it broke. All the pearls started rolling all over the floor and all the kids were trying to catch them ... all this while the teacher was trying to read a story. 9. I remember one day when my oldest brother David was trying to babysit us and we weren't listening to him. He got mad and said that he was going to run away from home and we would be in big trouble from my parents when they got home because he would be gone and it would be our fault. He left the house, and the four of us stood at the window crying as he walked up the street. 10. I remember our first teenage babysitter who had long brown hair. She would let us take turns and brush it. 11. I remember the day my brother, Rick, who has Down's Syndrome, came home. I was only 7. My mom showed us why he was so special ... because he had two fingers that were webbed, and his eyes were crossed. 12.I remember when my grandfather would come to visit. He would go out to the car to smoke and would let one of us go out with him to light the match. 13. I remember the Christmas that my sister snooped and cound out was everyone was getting, and then proceeded to tell those of us who didn't snoop what we were getting. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!)

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!


The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants



1. Amy
2. Joely Sue Burkhart
3. She
4. Julie in Texas
5. Christina
6. ChupieandJsmama
7. Christine
8. Brony
9. Laurie
10. Chelley

Some people have trouble getting the Dove Ad as they don't have the proper downloads to view it. Here it is as found on YouTube.

Real Women

An internet friend, Barb shared this ad on Scrapping Buddies. It totally blew me away when I watched it. Take a look here. It's an ad put out by Dove. I must say that I'm really impressed by Dove's ads lately and how they are trying to show real women, not the made-up, touched up, air-brushed, and photo shopped women that you see plastered all over magazines, TV commercials, and runways. While I knew this type of thing happened, it wasn't until I saw this Dove ad that it really impacted me. The end result looks nothing like the model that they started with, and yet, in my opinion, the real woman (the model as she started out) is far more beautiful. I think it's time for women to take a stand against what the media is doing to our perceptions of what beauty is. Why are we allowing the media to dictate to us what we should look like. Why do we have this perception that aging is bad, that wrinkles are bad, and that we need to have plastic surgery to be beautiful?

I'm jumping on board the Dove train and am going to be buying their products from now on. I love make-up as much as the next girl, but I don't think I'm trying to change the way I look, just enhance it. I think that from now on, I'm not going to hate the wrinkles I see in the mirror, but embrace them. I earned each and every one of them! I'm almost 45 and am proud of it!

Thirteen Things I've learned from my boys 1. Life is much better by just keeping the toilet seat up. Sitting on a wet toilet seat isn’t fun. 2. The mere mention of any bodily noise, or certain body parts is cause for hysterics. Who would have thought that just saying the word “butt” would be followed by 5 minutes of uncontrollable laughter? 3. Anything can be made into a weapon 4. The male brain can't seem to see anything below the knees. If something drops onto the floor, there it will stay because for some reason, no one sees it (except, of course, the only female brain in the house.) 5. There is no such thing as having too much lego. 6. When doing the laundry, look before sticking your hand into a pocket to see if it’s empty. 7. Closing flies are too much of a hassle so we just leave them open and hope no one notices. 8. Seeing a big machine doing something means that we have to stop and watch for a while. 9. Silence is not golden. It means trouble. 10. Cats can swim. 11. Home depot really is a cool store to go to. 12. If you need to figure out how to work an electronic device, hand it over to the boys. They will have it figured out in 30 seconds. 13. Cutlery is just something that takes up room on the table. Fingers work much better. …and who needs a serviette when your sleeve will work just as well. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!)

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!


The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

Family

One of the things I love best about Thanksgiving is being able to spend time with family without all the trappings and business of the other holidays. I enjoy being able to sit with my family around the table and just enjoy their company. I love to watch my children revelling in the acceptance, security, and love that only a family can bring. It warms my heart to see them enjoying that time almost as much as I do.

The day we got together with my family, Cameron was thrilled to be able to go out fishing with his "big cousin", Jason. Jason is an avid fisherman and Cameron is following in his footsteps. I had to smile when I got an email from Joanne with photos that Alyson (Jason's fiancee) took of their time together. In looking at the photos and watching Cameron as he looked at them, it reinforced my belief that extended family is so important to a child. In those few short hours bonds were made, as were many memories that will never be forgotten. Thanks, Jason, for taking the time to make a difference in the life on a little boy.

Photo Challenge

During our picture taking venture, Cathy and I were talking about setting up a photo challenge. Since David and Evie are both into photography as well, I thought it would be fun to do a monthly challenge. Each month a different person could host the challenge. At the beginning of the month the challenge would be set and on the last day of the month the participants upload their photos to their own blogs with links to the other participants blogs. Sound cool? Since I'm telling David, Evie and Cathy that they are already participants we have four already. Anyone else want to join in? My only stipulations are that if you are SLR you can't be in the automatic mode (this is especially for me as I find it hard to force myself out of the A mode) and if you are digital you can't alter photos before posting them.

Since this month is already a third of the way through I will set the first challenge and make it easy. The challenge this month is to take pictures of pumpkins. Easy. It can be anything pumpkin related ... or jack-o-lanterns. To allow for the jack-o-lantern pics the posting date will be by November 2nd. (I still need time to get the film in to be developed.)

Who's in???

Well, it's been a busy week. With Cathy being off we have gotten together three days. Wednesday was our scrap shopping trip as already noted. Thursday we drove up to the Elora Gorge where we spent the day taking pictures of the colours, the gorge, and each other. I'd never been there before but can't wait to go back. (we may head back there today to do some family portraits before heading to the in-laws for dinner.) I got some nice pictures. A lot of them I wasn't happy with the exposure on them ... live and learn.

We came upon this very cool old building.





We took pictures of each other.



My photo programme is acting up so I will have to come back later to upload more pictures.


On Friday the boys ended up having a PA Day (which, or course, I didn't know about until Thursday morning.) So Cathy and I took them down to Niagra Falls for the day on Friday. We spent some time at the bird aviary. I love it there. Then we walked along the boardwalk by the falls. I don't have those pictures as of yet.

And now it's Thanksgiving weekend which means we've been running around. Saturday Cathy hosted our family Thanksgiving and today we are heading to Guelph for John's family Thanksgiving.

So Cathy is off school for two weeks so today we decided that since it was raining, we were going to go scrapbook shopping. I know, I know. I don't need anything else to try to cram into my room, but it was raining. What else are we going to do? So we headed off to one of my favorite places, The Scrapping Bug. It's a great scrapbooking store. I love going there. She always has the best stuff. Kim, the owner, is the sweetest person and always has time to stop and chat. She has three boys the same age as mine so we always catch up with what the boys are doing. Misery likes company I guess. Go here to check out her layout gallery. Kim's gallery. I don't know how she finds time to create such amazing layouts on top of owning and running a successful store, and raising three boys.

Anyway, I was so flattered when Kim said that she checks my blog every so often just to see what I'm up to, so I gotta say hi. Hi Kim! ...and I just found her store's blog so I will be adding it to my links in my sidebar. No hiding now, Kim!

After hitting two different stores here's what I ended up with today. I'm supposed to be on a spending freeze. Ooops!



So, in honour of tomorrow's Thursday Thirteen, here's my list:

Thirteen Things that I bought while scrapbook shopping today 1…. black paper holder 2. sei letter stickers 3. other letter stickers 4. Heidi Swapp chip board letters 5. gel band aid stickers 6. metal nails 7. photo turns 8. cat cardstock stickers 9. band cardstock stickers 10. cat label paper 11. cat patterned paper 12. other patterned paper 13. a magazine (OK I'll admit that I didn't actually buy this, it was free, but I needed something for number 13.) Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!)

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!


The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

I'm back

It was a fabulous week away. I had so much fun hanging out with my scrapping buddies. We left at 6 a.m. Monday morning. It's about an 8 1/2 hour drive from Toronto but the drive took us 15 1/2 hours! We had to make some shopping stops along the way, then there was lunch, and supper, and pee breaks, and traffic. I was so glad to finally pull up into the Chalets and unpack all our stuff.

We managed to do a little touring, a lot of shopping, a lot of scrapping, and some of the ladies hit the spa. The leaves have already peaked there and so the views were spectacular.

I even managed a week away without too much drama going on at home. The only event was Cameron's leg (which he fell and had a small poke hole on the front of his shin that was infected before I left, but there were trips for exrays, trying to track down a specific dressing that the doctor ordered, another trip back to the doctor and more antibiotic. ...it looks like it's on the mend now ... which is good because otherwise he was going to have to have plastic surgery on it!) The boys fared well. Cameron tells me that he didn't even miss me, but I don't believe him.

While the week was way too short, it's good to be able to get things unpacked and organized again. We are definately going to make this a yearly event and next time it will be a full week.

I managed to get about 21 layouts done. Here's one of them: