Happy Birthday to me!

Today I'm 45. I now officially consider myself middle-aged. For all those younger people who are dreading their forties, let me tell you this. It's great. I'm really enjoying my forties more than I have any other decade.

So, to celebrate, here is my Thursday Thirteen for today:

Thirteen Things about Why life is great after 40 1. You are secure in who you are. It no longer matters to you what others might think. 2. You have a wide variety of experiences. 3. You’re able to say no and not worry about pleasing people. 4. Time is more valuable than money 5. You don’t try to suck in your gut and it doesn’t matter who sees it. 6. You can go to bed at 9 p.m. and not miss anything because all your friends are doing the same. 7. You acquire a new interest in all things medical and enjoy sharing medical information with your peers. 8. You secrets are safe with your friends because they won’t remember them either. 9. You don’t sweat the small stuff. 10. Speed limits are speed limits, not a starting point. 11. You gain the ability to read the weather through your body. You don’t need the meteorologist to tell you that it’s going to rain. 12. You have a convenient excuse now for forgetting appointments. 13. You really appreciate the finer things in life. Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. I am Jenn 2. Susan Helene Gottfried 3. Delightful Dutchess 4. Chelle 5. Maryanne 6. Dane Bramage 7. Smurf 8. Celfyddydau 9. Leanne

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 from my Scrapbooking retreat. As always, it was a lot of fun. I didn't get as much done as I would have liked, but the company was great and it was nice to spend that time with a wonderful group of ladies who share my passion. It was a smaller group than usual this time as we had two ladies who couldn't make it at the last minute, and three who had to leave early. We still had a great time and a lot of laughs.

Now, I need to get myself into the Christmas mode. I haven't got any of my shopping done yet. Today, the weather is nice and warm, so when Matt gets home from school we are going to get the lights up on the outside of the house.

The bathroom is tiled. The grouting will hopefully be completed today so I can start the painting and such. John was not real happy when I got home last night. He didn't enjoy the experience of tiling at all. It will all be worth it in the end.

Hey everyone ... those of you with blogs - UPDATE THEM!

New layouts

I just thought I'd pop in and share these newly scanned layouts. Then I gotta go to Home Depot to pick up the tile and grout. Tonight we start laying our new floor. (John doesn't know it yet!)

The Princess Layout is an "inspired" layout. In other words, I copied it from Cheryl on Cherished Scrapbooks. http://www.cherishedscrapbooks.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=5549&password=&sort=1&cat=999&page=1Look Here

So? What do you do with all your time?

That's a question that I hear on a fairly frequent basis. Yes, I'm a stay-at-home mom, and no, I don't work ... well, outside the home. I love to listen to Dr. Phil talk about stay-at-home moms. According to him, we work the equivalent of two full time jobs. To be honest, I don't know if I work more or less than my work-outside-the-home counterparts, but I do know that I work just as hard (and I have the tension headaches to prove it LOL!).

So? What do I do with my time? well, I start my day between 6 and 7. 6 If I need to go out early and so need a shower early or on the two days that Spencer needs to be at school for 7:20. The boys need to be dragged (yes, your read that right, DRAGGED) out of bed at 7 a.m. I spend the next hour going from one to the other making sure they're alive, kicking (but not each other) and actually progressing to getting out the door on time (with everything they need for the day.) If all goes well, we all head out the door at 7:55 to do the school run. I usually arrive back around 8:15 when I can sit and enjoy my breakfast and the peace and quiet of the house. This is my favorite time of the day. I surf the net and enjoy my tea.

Between the hours of 9:30 and 2:30 I run errands, do housework, have various appointments and meetings, grocery shop, organize, reorganize, - you know, all the boring stuff. If I'm lucky, I get to spend an hour or two scrapbooking (with the exception of my play day on Tuesday when I scrapbook with my scrapping buddies for the day.)

2:40 I go to school and pick Cameron up and check his backpack to make sure he has remembered all his books, agenda, etc so he can do his homework. Matthew and Spencer are both walking home right now. Spencer stays late two nights a week for band practise and so on those days I go and pick him up at 4. Once the boys are home it is homework, practising, cleaning rooms, and running them around to their different activities.

5:30 I start getting supper ready and we are usually eating at 7. After supper is usually homework for Cameron as he needs one of us to sit with him and help him. The other two finish off their homework if they haven't already, and I try and reorganize everyone for the next day. Thursday nights is band practise night so we all head into Toronto, leaving home around 7 and getting back around 10:30.

Cameron takes so long getting into bed at night and he really needs his sleep to be able to be successful the next day, so he heads up at 9 and is usually in bed at 9:30 with me sitting outside his door to make sure that he's quiet so he can fall asleep in good time. (I really wish I didn't have to do this, but he needs it for a good night sleep.)

If all goes as planned I go to bed at 10 and watch an hour of mindless TV before I go to sleep.

That's it. That's how I spend my time.

Oh, and by the way ... when I have time I do projects around the house.

Here, finally, are pics of Cameron's recently redecorated room. He wanted to have a fishing lodge.

This is my work in progress right now. It is the main floor washroom. It's a very small room that was very white and very boring. Our goal is to make it look a little bigger and nicer to be in. So, we decided to change the vanity to a petistal sink. The problem with this was that there was no tile under the vanity which means we have to retile. So, this is how if looks right now:

Arghhhhhh! I fought this for so long.

Migraine headaches. That's right. It's official. I officially suffer from the family female curse. I didn't want this to happen and I fought it. I denied that it was happening. ...but, the doctor broke the terrible news to me the other day. She shattered my beautiful state of denial and ignorance with four terrible words, "You have migraine headaches." I pleaded with her. I begged her to say it isn't so. ... but she did it ... she wrote it in my chart anyway. Nooooooooo!

At least I was partly right. I have been getting tension headaches, apparently due to tension and stress?!? When I broke the news to John we were driving home from band practise. He asked me where the stress was coming from. Hahahahaha. I said, turn around. He did, and saw the faces of our beautiful boys smiling back at him! (maybe I can blame the grey hair on them too!)

So, the doctor said my shoulders and neck are extremely tight and it's causing the tension headaches which are now moving very quickly into migraines.

So ... Mom, Joanne, and Cathy - move over and make room for me on the couch. I feel a migraine coming on!

I've made the switch over to Blogger beta. Has anyone else done this? The switch went fairly smoothly. The only thing I had to reinstall was my counter. So far it seems a lot easier to use and I can change the colour of the font which is cool.

Anyway, here are some recent layouts:

Sunday Ramblings

We just got home from Church and then a Divisional Youth Band concert. Spencer is now in the Ontario Central Divisional Youth Band. Today was their first concert since he has joined. I must say, I was very impressed, and a little scared for him. The music is a little challenging, (which is good because he needs to be challenged to move to the next level) and he is on the solo cornet bench. He looks so small compared to the rest of them. I would say most of the kids are in their late teens or early 20s and he's only 14.

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Yesterday John and I went to Home Depot in the morning for a tiling seminar. Our plan is to make the main floor washroom feel bigger. We want to put in a pedestal sink. Right now there is a vanity but, or course, underneath the vanity, are no tiles. So, we need to retile the floor before doing anything else. I hope I haven't bitten off more than I can chew. I think I'm up for the challenge.

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Debbie and I (hi Deb!) went out for lunch yesterday and then hit a couple of scrapbooking stores. I didn't come home with as much as I thought I would. Good news for my wallet I guess. We had a fun afternoon. I love spending time with her.

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I have the next scrapbooking retreat coming up in two weeks. This is the retreat that I organize (with the help of a great team) twice a year. I've pretty much got the retreat organized, now I just need to plan out the projects and layouts I want to get done while there. The ladies are all so much fun and it's always great to go away with them.

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I was digging through some pictures to show Deb yesterday and I saw these ones and knew that I would have to share here. These are more pictures from our afternoon in Niagara Falls with Cathy.

Thirteen Reasons why it's good to grow up in a big family 1. You're never lonely. 2. You have instant friends. You never need to worry that there's no one to play with. No matter where the family goes, the playmates go too. 3. There's always someone to blame for something you did. 4. There's always someone who will trade you your peas for their carrots 5. Life is never boring. There's always activity going on. 6. You learn at a young age how to get along with different people and personalities. 7. You learn how to help each other out and that you need each other, as parents have less time to spend with each child individually. 7. There's lots of support in times of need. (this is more true now then when we were kids.) 8. You know how to share. 9. You know that life isn't all about you. 10. You learn to appreciate your sisters' clothes because you know that in two years, they will be yours. 11. You know how to shower in five minutes. 12. Everynight feels like a slumber party. 13. Gowing up you loved watching the Brady Bunch and could totally relate (except the parents didn't look frazzled enough!) 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

A few weeks ago we did some rearranging of some furniture in the kitchen and family room. I moved a baker's rack to a corner in the family room to house all of Cameron's critters. On the top self is one of his fish tanks, on the middle shelf are his hermit crabs, and on the bottom, close to the floor, is the second fish tank. Oliver, our cat, has all of a sudden taken great interest in the fish tank and will sit beside it and watch. The funny thing is, that he no longer likes to drink from his water bowl. He now will paw at the lid of the tank until he gets it open, and then will stick his head in and drink the water. I guess this must be a cat delicacy. What I find interesting is that the fish don't seem to mind at all. If they are hungry, they will usually come to the surface while his face is in the bowl and try and nip his tongue.

OK, I just came from my brother's blog and am still busting a gut laughing. He attempted to submit some photos for the photo challenge, but he obviously didn't read the challenge ... or maybe subconsciously he did and he's saying that he's a potato head (or maybe finally realizing what we've all known for quite some time.)
Check it our here. Thanks for an early morning giggle, David.

While I still love working with film cameras, and am not yet ready to make the leap into the digital age, I feel like I'm always a little behind the times in my pictures. This week I took in four rolls to be developed. These rolls are only three weeks old, but I still feel that the "news" is old and so don't often share them here. So, you'll have to ignore the fact that you already know this because I'm sharing anyway.

Just before Thanksgiving, Cathy was off on her break and so we took one day and went to Niagara Falls for a few hours. (That's one of the perks of living here is that within an hour we can be walking along the boardwalk ... and it never gets old!) We took the boys into the Bird Aviary. I highly recommend this to anyone who is going to Niagara Falls. It's a great place ... definately worth the price of admission. Anyway, when I got these pictures back, I had to smile. I think you can tell how much the boys enjoyed themselves.

Thirteen Things That kept me from Thursday Thirteen last week



1. Trying to finish Cameron's room.
2. Putting furniture together (I love Ikea, but I hate putting things together)
3. Shopping for accessories for Cameron's room
4. Trying to finish the scrapbook that I was doing for Stephen and Gayle on our trip there this summer. I needed to get it done so my parents could take it out with them when they were going to visit.
5. Trying to print pictures for said album
6. Having to run out to Island Inkjet to get ink cartridges refilled as they were empty.
7. Band practise
8. Trying to preplan layouts that I wanted to do at a crop on Saturday
9. Having to run out and shop for those layouts for the crop on Saturday
10. Packing for the crop on Saturday
11. Reading a chapter in the book that we are studying in our Ladies Fellowship group
12. homework and activities with the boys
13. Cleaning the house that has been badly neglected for two weeks.BR />



Links to other Thursday Thirteens!

1. Silver
2. Kathy
3. The Little Woman
4. Tess Termulo
5. Leslie
6. Ali
7. Gail
8. Caylynn
9. Chupieandj'smama
10. Brony

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

November Photo Challenge

OK. The idea was to hand the challenge around each month so eveyrone gets a chance to come up with different ideas but I'm going to post this month's. Who wants to host if for next month?

I saw this challenge on a scrapbooking board and thought it was a cool idea. The original idea came from a photography board. November 30th is the deadline for this challenge.

Okay, I was reading through a photography board and saw this idea and thought it would be fun to try!

The assignment is a "Self Portrait"

BUUUUTTTTTT....

The challenge is that you are NOT to take a photograph of you...However, you are to try and find something that you feel symbolizes/represents you, reminds you of your feelings at this point in your life, etc.

When you post your photo, please feel free to explain the significance behind it.

Same rules as last time. If you are slr, no automatic mode. If you are digital, no retouching on the computer.

Lets see if we can get more players this time. Anyone and everyone is welcome to join in.

What a busy month. Life seemed to all of a sudden speed by me. Time to catch my breath. The last two weeks I've been trying to get Cameron's room redecorated including new furniture, all of which had to be put together, and finish up an album for my parents to take out to my brother. Well, it's all pretty much done. The album is now in Calgary ... finished with the exception of three layouts which will have to be sent when done. Cameron's room looks great. All I need to do there is accessorize. I will take pictures and post them later.

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So, I managed to get my photo done for the photo challenge. The night before halloween I went out and tried to get pictures of the pumpkin all lit up. None of them turned out. I managed to get this photo of Cameron with the pumpkin. So, this is my submission for the challenge:



I'm adding another one in here. This is Cameron's photo submission. He took this photo the day we went out to get the pumpkin. He had to make sure it didn't roll around in the van.



So, how did everyone else do? I saw a few on everyone's blogs, except Cathy, and Christyne. Come one girls, you have until tomorrow to get them posted!

Here's David's: Look here
And Evie's: look here
And Jenn's: Look here

Anyone else participating? You have until tomorrow. Don't forget to add links to each others' pictures.