A Weekend of Scrapbooking

I guess I should issue a word of warning. This will be a long post cause I have lots to share from the weekend. I spent the weekend down on the Capricorn Coast with a great bunch of girls scrapbooking. For the last 4-5 years a group of us have met once a month to scrapbook together and then in May each year we go away for a whole weekend of scrapbooking. We had 18 stay over for the weekend, with an extra 5 joining us just for the day on Saturday. I managed to get four layouts done which was pretty good considering that there were a few girls who have just started scrapbooking and needed a little help and encouragement. I think the highlight of the weekend for me was to see the joy they experienced from creating something that they loved. Quite a few of the girls I work with came too - so we had a real blast together. They are always up for a good laugh. On the Saturday afternoon a group of the girls visited one of the local scrapbooking shops, and this year when they arrived, the owner informed them that she had sold the business and that they could have 40% off everything. There were phone calls back to everyone at the retreat to let them know. A few of the girls left took off and you can imagine the excitement and the spending that went on, with a couple of the girls even buying fixtures to set up scrapbooking rooms at home. Rob celebrated her birthday with us and Jannett even celebrated her 29th wedding anniversary with us. All good reasons to celebrate (which we did of course).

First layout I did on the Friday night was an old blurry photo that I have of Sarah. It has been sitting in my photo stash for quite a while, and I love the joy and exuberance on her face. this is so Sarah, and it was a photo I definately wanted to scrapbook. Tried something new with this one, with a bit of layering going on. Am really happy with it - in fact I as pretty happy with all my layouts this weekend.

This second layout took me all day Saturday to complete - most of that time was taken in the journalling that all need to be cut up and glued in the correct order. Painfully slow task it was too. This photo was taken of Chloe at Easter just after she had her hair coloured, and the journalling is about making the most of her life, understanding that people will let her down and she will probably let people down also, but life offers no guarantees, no second chances, so you need to live life to the fullest, let those you love know it, hold someones hand, smile till your face hurts, don't be afraid to take chances on love, live in the moment because every second you spend feeling angry or upset is a second of happiness you will never get back.

A couple of weeks ago I was deleting a heap of text messages off my mobile phone when I came across a couple of texts my daughter had sent me. I struggled to delete them, because they are special, so I thought why not photograph them and do a layout about what they mean to me. I am truely blessed to have such wonderful kids who are not afraid to let me know that they love me. I do indeed feel blessed and treasured.

The last layout was just a funky fun layout I decided to do about the mess in my youngest daughters room. You cannot see her study desk

for junk - make-up, jewellery, chocolate wrappers etc. Is it any wonder that she is always

laying on the lounge floor to do her homework. Used really bright colours for this layout - a bit different to what I would normally use, but it was fun to do.

Thought I would also share some photos from our weekend. They are really a great bunch of ladies and although I have been absolutely stuffed today - the weekend was well and truely worth it. Only trouble is it usually takes you 24 hours or so to get into your scrapbooking and then it is nearly time to pack up and come home. Have so many good ideas running through my head at the moment for layouts - need to try and find some time to scrapbook.

This photo of us all was taken around the pool just after lunch on the Saturday. The place we stayed at had this giant air cushion that everyone had a good jump on before they headed back to scrap in the afternoon so I just had to capture some of the girls having fun on this. (Mind you this was not an activity for those with a weak bladder) and a few of the girls were complaining about sore muscles a little later in the day.

Had to take some photos of the girls with some of their finished layouts too - these were a few of the girls left cleaning up just after lunch on Sunday.

The next photo is a photo of my work mates - they provided much entertainment on the weekend - they can always find something to laugh about and are good fun to be around. Loved how we all got to spend the weekend together.

Also have a photo of Jannett (in blue) and Rob cutting their anniversary and birthday cake. True scrapbookers they are. Fancy wanting to spend the weekend away with a bunch of girlfriends on these special occassions. Final photo is one of me working on one of my layouts.

It is

a pretty busy time of year in our household at the moment. Steve is flat out setting exams, and after today will be flat out marking them. Chloe starts her exams tomorrow so there will be little social life for her for the next couple of weeks. It is not quite so bad for me (except of course that the others are busy around me) but next week should see me pretty busy then until the holidays as

I will have a couple of work campaigns that need to be done before I go away. Fortunately we have a couple of short weeks coming up with next week being

show week in Rocky so we have a public holiday on the Wednesday and then the following week, a holiday on the Monday to celebrate the Queens Birthday Weekend.

Got the results back from my biospy last Wednesday but they are not conclusive so have to be sent away to Brisbane to find out exactly what is causing the problem. Seems it is some micro-organism. The good news though is it is not malignant. I am very thankful for that, but it will be good to find out what it is and how they can treat it. Should hear something this week hopefully. It is now 8 weeks since my forehead flared up.

Big thanks to everyone who drops by and reads and comments on my blog - I enjoy hearing from you all and your lovely comments are much appreciated. Well I'm off to visit the chiropractor - I will catch up again a bit later. Hoping that I will manage to get some more scrapbooking done this week whilst I am feeling so motivated.

Scrapbooking Drought has broken

Well after not scrapbooking for almost a month, the drought finally broke last night when I sat down and scrapbooked Nat Mardon's Challenge from the Scrap of Faith Cyber Crop on Saturday night. I sat down last night to get some ideas for our upcoming Scrapbooking Retreat this weekend and ended up doing the above layout.

My layout was inspired by the service we had at church yesterday morning about living a disciplined life and choosing each day to seek after Godiness. Funny how God really draws your attention to something cause then last night when I was flicking through some layouts I have stored on my computer to get some inspiration for our retreat this weekend I came across a layout by Brenda-Mae Teo which dealt with this very topic so I pinched her title and part of her journalling cause it so expressed what God was saying to me this morning during our service. We also had to add a verse of scripure to our layout so my verse of scripture comes from Joshua 24:15. I am really happy with it and it feels good to have broken the drought of creativity.

I also managed to finish off the last layout from the Embellished retreat which was a month ago, and really like this layout too. Love the papers we got to use. Really suited a masculine layout.

It has been a pretty big week this week. Embellished Scrapbook Shoppe opened their doors to the public in Rockhampton this week, and on Thursday night Ali and Ang had invited all those that had attend their class to a nibbles and champagne night at the new shop. They have done a totally awesome job and the shop looks great. They have a great range of papers and lots of wonderful Heidi Swapp products. There classes for the next month look fantasic and I can't wait to get back into them. So going to love shopping there, and the added bonus will be, that I will be supporting a friend.

Last Friday I had a bit of minor surgery done on my forehead. The doctor has done a biopsy on a lump and mark that came up over Easter. Initially I thought it was a reaction to a sandfly bite, but after a course of antibiotics, a couple of doses of antibiotic creams, it is still there, still causing problems and leaves the sensation of something crawling under my skin. Had to walk around for a day or so with a huge patch on my forehead. Go back on Wednesday to get the stitches out and the results so hoping that all is OK and they will know how to treat it to get rid of it. I have had it now for 7 weeks and it is just plain annoying.

Before the surgery - Steve and I went to school with Craig and Sharon's boys for the morning. It was Grandparents Day at their school and they put on a special concert and then we got to go into the boys classroom with them for a half hour each before we had offical photos taken and were treated to morning tea. It was a real honor for us that the boys wanted us to go, and we wouldn't have missed it for anything (even though we don't feel old enough to be called grandparents). Love those kids to bits and are going to miss them so much when they go back to PNG in 6-7 weeks time. It will be another three years before we get to see them and spend time with them again.

For the past 4 years, I have been part of a group of scrapbookers that meet once a month to scrapbook together. This weekend we are all off to the Capricorn Coast to spend the weekend scrapbooking at our annual retreat. So looking forward to it - just got to organise my scrapbooking and work out what I want to do, and try and minimise the gear that I take. Usually the boot of the car is chocoblock full and I can assure you it is not clothes. The girls from work are coming so it should be a really good weekend. Lots of laughs, and sharing of ideas.

Lastly would love to share a couple of photos that Steve took whilst sitting at a check point during their schools cross country run last month. They are just awesome photos - the perfect day, this beauty is around us everyday - just that we often miss it because we are so busy living life we don't have time to stop and appreciate it. Definately want to scrapbook these photos.

Not a lot more news this week - Hopefully will have a few layouts to share after this weekend. Hoping to get a few circle journals finished as well. Slowing starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel where these are concerned.

Things I am thankful for this week

1. The Goodness of God

2. A Blessed Life

3. Eternity in our hearts.

4. Treasured Friendships.

5. And an awesome husband and sensational kids.

Birthday Celebrations and Mother's Day

It has been a busy week full of birthday celebrations. I'm sorry that I have absolutely nothing to show you where scrapbooking is concerned. Haven't even had a chance even to finish off my layouts from the Embellished retreat. Sarah's birthday last week and Chloe's birthday this week. She celebrated it by have a little dinner at home the night of her birthday with her close friends Amy and Caitlin and their parents coming for dinner. Her friends James and Brendan arrived just in time to see her blow out her candles and share desert with her. She got horribly spoilt by her friends at school. They all put in an bought her an ipod. She was teary and speechless and overwhelmed by their generousity and felt so special. I must admit as a parent it is really wonderful to see you kids enjoying the friendships of other truely great people.

Saturday night Chloe had a 16th Birthday Party as part of the youth group that she goes too. It was a really hectic weekend, because another good friend of ours also had his 50th Birthday Party on the same night. We managed to get to Dan's party for a couple of hours and then we headed over to Chloe's youth group to feed the tribes there, have some fun with the kids. It was funny, Chloe wanted to play these crazy party games. This photo is the end result of a musical clothes game they played. Funny how things go round. Some of the games were games we used to play at her age - hard for her to beleive that we games that we played at her age were suddenly popular once again. We ended up bringing 6 of the girls home for a sleep over. A couple of the guys came up home for an hour or so also. Mind you they were all pretty tired today as I don't think they had much sleep - I didn't either.

Happy Mother's Day to to all you wonderful mothers out there. I have had a wonderful day with both of my older children ringing me early this morning. Got perfume, and beautiful cards for my Mothers Day this year. Have had a great day, haven't prepared a meal all day. Had lunch with Dan and Jenni and their family( the left over's from Dan's 50th last night) and then this evening my boss from Uni and her husband were in town on their holidays and took us out for dinner. We had a lovely time with them. Suzanne is the best boss anyone could ever ask for. Hope you have all been spoilt rotten today too.

Thank you to all you wonderful people who read this blog and leave such lovely and encouraging messages. I love hearing from you all. Hopefully I will at least get a bit of motivation this next week and get a bit of scrapbooking done.

This week is also big week for Ali and Ang as they open Embellished as a shopfront here in Rocky. Iam looking forward to celebrating this big week with you both and I wish you every success with your venture together. Looking forward to checking the shop out and scrapbooking with you all some more real soon .

Such a slack Blogger

I have been such a slack blogger this last couple of weeks, but life continues to be hectic in the Latham household. Not much time for scrapbooking, too busy recovering from the Embellished Retreat last weekend and entertaining.

Had a great time at the Embellished Retreat. Got to meet lots of lovely ladies and see some awesome scrapbooking done. It was so much fun, haven't laughed so much in ages, and didn't get much sleep. (It has taken me all week to recover but it was so worth it) Ali and Ang did a wonderful job organinsing the retreat, the classes and packs were fabulous and I can't wait for next year. Thought I might share a photo of us all ( courtesy of Ali - you have no idea the lengths we went to - to get this photo but we had a great time doing it) plus a few of the projects we did. Still have a BTP project and a Layout that I have not yet finished but hopefully I will get them done in the next week or so and share. We even received an Embellished T Shirt as part of our kit. Think the photo of us all wearing it looks awesome too.

This is my Layout from Micaela Kirchin's Friday night class. I especially love the choices of papers that we had for this class and love this Layout. It was pretty simple but very eye catching. Quite nostelgic doing this layout - you wonder where the years have gone. My baby turns 16 in a couple of days. A young woman already.

On Saturday morning Tammy Leaver class was decoring a little notebook. Lots of tearing and inking for this class. Even managed to do a bit of doodling as well. Chloe loves it and want me to show her how to make this little one. So simple to do and it really didn't take that long. Julie Heard's class saw us using some bright funky Urban Lily papers, and also playing with some transperancies and felt. Got to do a bit of handsewing and had fun with the white gel pen. Love this Layout too.

We had fun on the beach in the afternoon getting some photos and then came back for Sarah Gladman's workshop. This was a little mini album. This project was a ton of fun, as we used paints, ribbons, and any embellishments we could find. I did my mini album for Chloe as it is her 16th Birthday this week, and wanted her to know just how special she is. Got really carried away with this little album and worked into the evening with it.

Still have a couple of projects to finish. This week is sure to be busy with Chloe's birthday . We have guests coming over on the night of her birthday for dinner and then on Saturday she is having a party and then will have some of the girls sleeping over. Seems there is a constant stream of kids sleeping over here lately. Have had a house full again all weekend. We also have a 50th Birthday party to attend on Saturday night as well so it will be a very hectic week.

Had friends over yesterday and got to see their new baby son. He is so gorgeous and so cute. Got to have lots of lovely cuddles and even managed to get a couple of nice photos. Meet baby Elliott. Gorgeous son of Mark and Emma. So good to see you guys and meet your little man.

Our good friends Craig and Sharon and their children also spent the day with us yesterday and Lauren was very happy to pose for this lovely photos. Got so many - it is going to be hard to choose which ones I want to scrap. Need to start taking lots of photos of them now as it is only another 7 weeks until they get ready to go back to PNG and it will be 3 years until we see them again. I am going to miss these kids so much - they will have grown so much by the time we see them next.

Well not much more to post - hopefully will have lots of happy birthday shots to share with you next.

Things I am thankful for this week.

1. Always thankful for my wonderful husband and amazing family.

2. Thankful for good friends - both ours and our kids.

3. Thankful for the simple things in life - the little things that bring a smile to your face every day.

4. Thankful for our church family who also love and support us.

5. Thankful that in this country we get paid holidays. (Had a great day today)

Hopefully will be back with more to share sooner than this last post. Have a great week everyone.