Caterpillars for Kylie.

I took these pictures for my niece Kylie, who is a bug...I was going to say "bug lover," but "bug adorer" would be more accurate. These little buggers ate half of my enormous dill plant a couple weeks ago. Last year, at our condo, they munched my parsley plant down to a few bare stalks, but I guess this year the dill looked more appealing.

Maybe they'll come back to visit in their butterfly stage soon!

I'm baaaa-aaack.

Several people have informed me that I am being terribly neglectful of my blog. I admit it's nice to be missed.

I've been in a summer funk, where nothing seems important, and thoughts are too heavy or tiresome to write down. After many years of being a depressed person, I understand now that it's cyclical. It cycles in and out of my life, and the best I can do is just ride it out.

Sometimes when you're in the thick of it, it feels like you've always felt this way, that your whole life has been a feeble gesture in the face of despair, and you'll never be hopeful again. It's important to cling to reality and believe you'll feel good again. I'm better at that now...I understand myself better.

I'm lucky...the lows aren't as low as they were 10 or 15 years ago when depression really derailed my life. But yeah, last week was kinda low. No real reason, I guess it was just my time. I can point to a couple things, like summer heat and feeling sealed up in this house, but there's always something that my mind latches onto and turns into a reason for feeling bad.

I try not to write about feeling bad or cranky or angry here because I hate reading other people's whiny blogs, so I don't want to subject anyone to my whines. Anyway, this week is better.

In the calm between moods, I've hit several garage sales and flea markets and picked up some really interesting odds and ends for the house, so I will try to get some pictures up and running soon. I'm also purging my scraproom yet again for a community scrapbooking sale in a couple of weeks. I've really been ruthless, and I have several boxes going--fingers crossed I can sell it all and make some cash. The purging has gone hand in hand with a major re-arranging and re-purposing in my study, too, in an attempt to undo the effects of "just get it moved in, I don't care where you put it." Three moves in four years have really put a crimp in my organized life!

Anyway, I'll be back later, hopefully with pics.

Random thoughts.

-I'm going to do a rain dance--the sky is getting gray and I SO don't want to have to water my garden tonight!

-Once again, I'm down to the wire and wondering what projects to create for my home class tomorrow morning.

-I'm tired of having to think about what to make for supper.

-The crape myrtles are blooming and they are just gorgeous. I can see a white one and a purple one from my window, and there are hot pink ones out on the street, too.

-I want fall to come but I'm afraid of trying on my jeans and having none of them fit.

-I wish the summer Olympics were this year so there'd be something fun to watch on TV.

My ribbon rack.

The blog challenge at Two Peas today is to share a scrapping organization tip, and I've been wanting to share this great ribbon rack for months, so here's my chance.

Todd made this for me for Christmas. It hangs on the back of my scraproom door and I can thread all my ribbon spools on the dowels. Long unspooled bits of ribbon get wound onto empty paper towel rolls and threaded on, too.

This is such a convenience, I can't even tell you! Isn't Todd a sweetie?

I swept and mopped the kitchen and foyer floors, ran the dishwasher, emptied the dish drainer, washed some pots and pans, and tidied up. I still need to weed the front flower beds, but it is so hot and humid outside, and I can't make myself get up early enough to go out when it's bearable. I'm not sure it's ever bearable out there at this point, honestly.

Gardening seems like such a great idea in April...then you get into July and August, and it doesn't seem worth it to have to be out there in the heat, trying to keep your precious plants alive, while trying to eradicate the weeds which seem to have NO problem springing up, no matter how dry and fiery it gets outside. URGH.

In other news, I came across the August/Spetember Paper Crafts the other day, which has a "Project Fiskars" insert inside with some of my work from February...a frame, a school set, and a party set. Now I just need my paycheck for that...!

I found the Autumn Leaves "Freestyle" book finally, at my LSS. Better late than never, I guess. It's so far removed from my style, and yet I'm hoping to find some inspiration in some small ways. Now thatI have my housework mostly done, and my scraproom tidied up, I think I'll scrap a few pics this afternoon!

Pasta salad.

Today's blog challenge at Two Peas is to post a favorite BBQ/grilling recipe. One of my favorite things to make with grilled meat is a pasta salad. I came up with my own mixture, trying to emulate an antipasto type of thing.

You need:
one 16-oz box of your favorite pasta (I like rotini/corkscrews, and I used some wheat ones last time that held up really well and tasted great)
a 1/4-lb chunk of salami, cubed
a 1/4-lb chunk of provolone cheese, cubed
a few grilled red peppers (either homemade or from a jar)
a small jar of marinated artichoke hearts, drained and chopped
a handful each of chickpeas and kidney beans (can be omitted if you're cooking for a bean-hater like my DH)
half a chopped green pepper for crunch and color
a pint or so of grape tomatoes, cut in half
a bottle of "Just 2 Good" Italian dressing from Wishbone

Boil and drain the pasta, chop up all the goodies, throw 'em together in a big bowl, and squeeze as much dressing over it as you want. Start with less, then add more if it needs it. Last time, I used most of a bottle, which surprised me. Throw it in the fridge and let it sit for a couple hours before dinner. This is a super make-ahead side dish, perfect with grilled chicken and grilled sweet corn.

Pirates: crusty.

We went to see Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest tonight, and my primary thoughts about this flick were:

Crusty. And gooey.

I mean, look at this:

And this:

I wish I could find a picture of Will Turner's dad--he was crusty in the extreme. And gooey.

Everybody in this film was crusty, gooey, and/or in extreme need of dental treatment. And a hot soapy bath. Only the lovers, Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley, looked semi-clean and non-nauseating.

Yeah, it was sorta fun, and yeah--even dirty, skeezy-toothed, eye-linered and fey, Johnny Depp is hot. Good swordfights and a few scenes that made my mouth drop open wondering how--even with stunt doubles and models--exactly how did they film that?

But mostly...just crusty. And gooey. Can't wait for number three--maybe it will inspire me to vomit right in the aisle! Good times.

And a few more pics.

I feel terrible that I didn't take any pictures of my side of the family...no pictures of my treasure hunt with Tanner and Kylie, no pictures of our picnic at my folks' that night. In my defense, I was exhausted that day!

All I got was a few pictures from Kylie's very first t-ball practice the night before we left for home. She's the girl in green, and her dad, my BIL Ky, is the coach. These kids could NOT have been any cuter!

When I first started scrapping, I was too much of a photog. A million pictures of every little thing--too many. Now I've gone too far in the other direction--I never have a camera handy when I need it, and I never seem to get pictures of the things I wish I had afterwards. There are so many people I left out of the photo record this visit! And when you only make it home a couple times a year, it feels so much more important to get everything on film. Or on memory card, to be more up-to-date.

I think that's partly why I stopped trying--it all felt so important, I started getting tired of feeling like I needed to have a camera attached to my face all day long. I'm wondering if I need to make a list of the pictures I definitely want during a trip, so I can at least get those, and not feel so bad about missing so much.

More vacation pics.

I seem to only be able to put a few pictures in a post now. Delightful!

Here's a few more pics, me with Miss G:

Todd's dad sailing his boat:

Todd driving the pontoon boat on a gorgeous chilly lake evening:

Me enjoying the sunset boat ride. It's been two years since I've been to the lake in the summer, and I forgot how wonderful it smells and how beautiful it is. It's honestly one of my favorite places on earth. So many happy memories there.

Back home again.

Got home Saturday from a week in Ohio over the Fourth of July. It was so nice in Ohio, I didn't want to come home. It was humid the first few days, but after a day of rain--on the Fourth--it got wonderfully cool. Still sunny, but a cool breeze--I mean, it was really heaven.

I had planned to spend most of the beginning of the week at the lake where Todd's folks live, getting more time in with my SILs and nieces and nephew. But my parents ended up having a few days free, and I spent quite a bit of time with them. It might sound silly for a 35-year-old woman to say, but I quite liked having some "mom and dad" time--having them all to myself. It happens very seldom, and it was really nice! I also had breakfast with a couple of my aunts, my sister and my cousin Janine, did a little shopping with my aunt Carol, and had a treasure hunt with Tanner and Kylie.

It's always hard when we're at home--no matter who I'm spending time with, I feel bad that I'm not spending it with someone else. Even with a week's time, there still wasn't enough time to see everyone I wanted, and to do everything I'd planned.

But it was still great. I hadn't realized how much I miss cornfields, and barns, and gently rolling hills. I honestly wished I didn't have to come back to Newport News.

Some pics:

Angelo, Evelyn and Gianna on my FIL's pontoon boat. I can't believe how big they all look!

Gianna and Angelo playing with balloons inside. The Fourth was so rainy, we had to do a few indoor things with the kids. The balloons kept them busy and happy for a good 45 minutes. Here's Todd showing them how to draw a face on a balloon. Then they deflated it and watched it get tiny!

Raindrops keep fallin' on my head.

Or they would if I ever left the house. Rainy, rainy, rainy. You wouldn't believe how much rain we've had the past week.

Not as much as Baltimore and D.C., but still! It's fascinating, too--you wouldn't even need radar pictures to tell you the rain is sweeping across in bands. It pours, peters out, almost clears up...and then you notice the sky has darkened again and the clouds are gathering to the west. Then it's pouring again.

Our normally-a-trickle creek down at the bottom of our yard is quite swollen. Last Friday we got about three hours of torrential rain, and the creek rose a good three feet, spilling out into the ravine like a little river. It's not that dramatic this week, as there are lulls between the cloudbursts. It's pretty full, though.

I've been checking other bookmarked blogs today, and it looks like June is a slow month for many of us. I could plead busy-ness the first few weeks of the month, but lately it's just ennui. Not sleeping well, not eating well, feeling very clouded over, just like the skies. It's a mild depression cycle, I recognize them quite well by this time. Nothing feels very important, or like it matters very much. I'm waiting it out, and figuring that a week in Ohio over the Fourth of July will ease me out of it somewhat.

When I come back from Ohio, the crackdown will happen. Time to take care of myself...I don't know why it's so hard to be good to yourself, but I suck at it! Probably because all the good things you have to do for yourself don't sound like fun--eating right, exercising, staying on top of finances, keeping the house tidy, yada yada. But they really make a difference, and I know it.

I'm enjoying the rain. It's a nice change of pace from hot, sunny and humid. We definitely have humid, but the temps are reasonable, and the cloudy skies make the house feel cozy and safe.

My new blog!

I decided to start a food blog, with recipes and food memories. It's called Fresh Sweet Corn--check it out!

I've been wrestling with Blogger for a couple of days, trying to get a few more pictures up. No luck yet, and I have a headache tonight, so no wrestling tonight. We got a massive thunderstorm through here late this afternoon, and the headache came along with the change in pressure.

Our creek has swollen awesomely with the couple hours' worth of heavy rain. Looks like a small river down there. Todd is very excited.

I got an e-mail from Simple Scrapbooks the other evening, asking for a layout for their December issue. As SS is my very favoritest magazine, I was pretty pleased! It's a page I did about baking fruitcake and my memory of the home-baked fruitcakes my grandpa used to send us.

Taught my at-home scrapbooking class today with four students, which is about all the dining table can hold anyway. We had a splendid time!

That's it, I'm beat.

Where I've been.

We waved off the last of our June guests yesterday morning. Todd's sister Lisa, her husband Tony and their girls Evelyn and Anna were here for four days, and we had a super time.

I was eager to spend some one-on-one time with the girls, especially Anna, who is almost two. Distance and work have really limited the time I've been able to spend with her in her short life, and I wanted to make up for that this weekend.

Anna is busy, busy, busy, but we did have some fun moments blowing bubbles and digging in the sand. We worked on naming "Aunt Janelle" and "Uncle Todd," and she completely amazed us, as they rolled down the driveway yesterday morning, by waving and saying quite clearly in her two-year-old dialect, "Bye, Aunt Janelle! Bye, Uncle Todd!"

Evelyn was my sidekick all weekend, which was great. I've spent a little more time with her, as she's almost four, but it's been few and far between, and she's always been a tiny bit shy with us. That was completely gone this weekend, and we colored with crayons and sidewalk chalk, tossed the soccer ball around, blew bubbles, had tea parties, cooked together, and watched DVDs together. She's just a pleasure to hang out with.

Here's Evelyn and Anna at the Yorktown beach:

The weekend before last, my parents, my sister Jenita, and her kids Tanner and Kylie paid us a short but action-packed visit. Dad had been promising the kids that he'd take them to the ocean this summer, and they were beyond excited. We went to Sandbridge beach, and I have never seen two kids have more fun than they did. Tanner and Todd jumped in the waves, and Todd showed Tanner how to boogie-board. Kylie looked for clams and crabs and other critters, and did a little small-scale boogie-boarding, too. It was such a fun day!

I'm having technical difficulties posting pictures all of a sudden, so I'll finish updating later. Stupid Blogger.

Summer plans.

Today's blog challenge at Two Peas seems particularly appropriate today:

Special family plans this summer, we all have them.
What are yours?
What are you doing that you consider SPECIAL this summer?
What are you anticipating?

Well, as we are heading into June, I'm actually anticipating quite a lot! Todd's sister Julie and her two kids are flying in tomorrow and staying till Monday.

Next Friday is my niece Marissa's first birthday party in Harrisonburg. My dad, mom, sister, nephew, and niece are all coming down for that, and then journeying on to our house to stay from Saturday till Monday.

The following weekend, Todd's other sister, her husband, and their two girls are coming for a long weekend.

The next weekend, my friend Cheryl and I are talking about running up to Chantilly, VA for the Great American Scrapbook Convention.

And the weekend after that is Fourth of July weekend, and we'll be heading up to Ohio for five days or so.

And there you have it--June, poof!--gone in the blink of an eye. I'm not sure what is happening the rest of the summer...there will probably be a short visit from my brother's family in there somewhere, but we won't have any vacation time left to take any fun trips. Such is the sacrifice of living so far away from family!

We spent Memorial Day weekend painting our downstairs half-bath red. Bright red. Tonight Todd is going to put in the new light fixture, towel bar, and TP holder. I painted the dark wood vanity white, and the doors red...but I had them outside to paint them, and the humidity has been off the charts, and the paint has never fully dried. Not too sure what I'm going to do about that...?

Anyway, home improvement chores combined with menstrual hormones = lots of muttered and not-so-muttered bad words. I hate to paint on a good-mood day...on a bad-mood day, it really sucks. Todd was a sweetie and took on most of it himself, since the bathroom isn't big enough for both of us to be in it at the same time. I still managed to drip pink primer and red paint on quite a few surfaces, though.

Oh, yes, the pink primer. I had the paint guy at Lowe's tint the primer for me since I figured it would take the red better. It was PEPTO pink. Pink Panther pink! We were cracking up as we slapped it on the walls...it gave off quite a rosy glow. Of course, so does the red. I'm not sure what I think about it, to be honest. I know when we turn around to sell this place, the potential buyers are going to moan and groan about it!

I'll post some pictures if we ever get it done.

Friday funk.

I've felt so BLAH the last couple of days! Just very nothing-going-on-upstairs. Blank, blah, blue.

I tweaked my neck and shoulder, either flying kites on Tuesday, or sleeping on our hard hotel bed Tuesday night, and that is definitely slowing me down and adding to the blahs.

In lieu of anything more interesting, here's a layout I did a couple weeks ago for an ongoing contest at Scrapforums. The topic for the first challenge was to use any part of the lyrics of the Dixie Chicks' new song, "Not Ready to Make Nice." We could use all of it or just a word or two, in the title or in the journaling.

The song is a pretty mad, defiant song, and I really don't "go there" in my scrapbooking. Plus, I'm not really in that kind of place right now in my life. I pulled virtually the only positive sentiment out of the song, the line: "It turned my whole world around, and I kind of like it."

I was going to scrap about some things in my life that seemed negative but turned out to have positive results. That seemed too complicated (and I'll be honest--too much thought involved), so I decided to scrap about how scrapbooking has turned my world around. I took pictures of all my tools and radiated those around my paper-pieced globe. I'm pretty pleased with it. I took it out on the sunny deck to photograph it, so the lights and shadows look a lot more extreme than they really are.

Got my "40 Techniques" book in the mail today, along with all my cards, so I updated my resume while I was thinking about it. It's seriously time to start submitting again!

Happy birthday, Grandma.

Thought I'd give Grandma her own separate post, because she deserves it! My Grandma Martin is 86 years old today. In the past five months, she's experienced a broken hip, with surgery, and a bad gall bladder, also requiring surgery, but she's doing well. I know life isn't completely easy for her, but she gets through with grace and a good spirit.

This picture is one that Grandpa took of her around the time they got married in 1943. It's been through quite a few years of bad handling since then. A couple months ago, Grandpa asked my mom to see if she could get the photo restored.

I talked to my dad last week, and he said the restored copy came out wonderfully--not a crease or rip to be seen. When my mom gave it to Grandpa, he got tears in his eyes and said to my dad, "Wasn't she beautiful?"

Well, she still is, of course. And she is very loved, and I hope she feels that love today in abundance. Happy Birthday, Grandma!

Mini-break.

Ever since I read Bridget Jones' Diary to Todd several years ago, he's been fascinated with the concept of a "mini-break." It's just a weekend getaway, but "mini-break" sounds so much more...Continental.

So that was my "pack a bag" surprise yesterday for our anniversary. First, Todd came home at lunch time, bringing me my present: a teeny tiny MP3 player. Then we went to our favorite diner for lunch, and then down to Mt. Trashmore in Virginia Beach to fly kites. Then we stopped at the LSS there--and they had the new Paper Crafts book that I contributed to, and that I've been DYING to see for months! So we sat and looked through that, and found all my cards. It was such an unexpected treat!

Then we went over to Portsmouth and had dinner at our absolute favorite German restaurant, the Biergarten. Their claim to fame is having umpteen-dozen fancy beers on tap, but since I don't drink beer, and Todd doesn't drink at all, that part is sort of lost on us.

What they do have is fabulous bratwurst, knockwurst, cabbage, sauerkraut, dilly green beans, German potato salad, of course...oh, and Black Forest cake. And excellent coffee. It's delectable.

Then we drove back up to Yorktown, walked along the river in the dark, spent the night at the hotel on the river, got up and took another walk along the river...then we had lunch, and Todd went off for an afternoon at work.

Wasn't that a nice mini-break? I'm happy Todd thought of it.

Here's the cover of the book--I'm kind of surprised they went with this all-white look for the cover, but the book is really excellent: spiral-bound with a built-in stand, tabbed sections for each set of techniques, designer and theme indexes, and a DVD with 40 extra cards. I'm really thrilled it's finally out...it was fun to do the projects for it.

Pretty girls.

Apparently Todd was lying when he said we were going to celebrate our anniversary on the weekend, because he e-mailed me this morning and told me to pack a bag and that he was coming home at lunchtime. So I'm sitting here waiting for him to get home any minute now. I'm all curious!

Thought I'd blog while I was waiting and share this layout I finished yesterday, which I really like. I like the big picture of the girls at the bottom. They are both so beautiful!

The journaling is probably not legible, so in a nutshell--this is my sister's daughter (the big girl) and my brother's daughter (the tiny girl). They are both the second kids in their families, and it's been funny to see how Marissa, the baby, is so much like Kylie, the big girl, was as a baby. Kylie was the squirmiest, movingest little thing you ever saw--crawling on stuff, climbing like a monkey, absolutely fearless. And Marissa is the same way. They both have the same little spark of devil in their eyes. This was the first time I've seen them together when Marissa was really old enough to respond to Kylie, and they really just connected. I just think they are the loveliest things, don't you?

Oh, and Kylie is the very little girl in the Father's Day frame below. She is growing up so fast--well, they all do!

Sunny Sunday.

Just another quiet Sunday here. Todd's been out fishing all day and I've been hanging out in my PJs, doing laundry, messing around on the computer. It's a nice day to be inside, with the windows open and the ceiling fans blowing a breeze around.

Yesterday we went down to the Outer Banks for the day, to celebrate our....drumroll, please...fourteenth anniversary. Fourteen years--and I'll go ahead and trot out all the clichés here:

It hardly seems possible!
Seems like our wedding was just yesterday!
Time flies when you're having fun!

...because they're all sort of true. It's definitely been fun. Lots and lots of life experiences between that day and this, lots of laughs and giggles and shared jokes, blessedly few tears, lots of places we've been and things we've seen together. I love being married to this guy and hopefully he feels the same!

Our actual anniversary is Tuesday, but as Todd pointed out, yesterday was really the anniversary, as we were married the third Saturday in May, so it made sense to celebrate on the convenient weekend day.

It was a gorgeous day...we hit a few shops in Kill Devil Hills and Nag's Head, spent an hour on the beach at Nag's Head, ate lunch at our favorite BBQ place, and had dinner at a tiny local bar/seafood joint. We honeymooned on the Outer Banks, and the weather was gray and cloudy and COLD, the whole week. Yesterday couldn't have been different, except for one thing--the water was just as freezingly cold!

I felt like I should take tons of pictures, but it is such a pain dragging a camera around. I did get a few, but I don't know if they were any good. Todd took the camera on the boat with him today, so I can't check yet.

Todd called a few minutes ago and said he's bringing home some freshly caught sea bass, so I suppose I should do a little Net research and find out the best way to cook it for dinner tonight!

At last!

I found something exciting at Barnes and Noble today--my Father's Day frame on the last page of PaperWorks magazine. I've been waiting for this for like eight months! It's the first time I've ever been published in this magazine.

This is a picture of my brother-in-law Ky and his kiddies Tanner and Kylie, taken on Father's Day, as a matter of fact, by Todd. We were in Missouri for a family reunion, three years ago. The kids look so little! Especially Kylie.

It's a drop-dead gorgeous day today--breezy, sunny, even a tiny bit chilly in the wind. I love spring days like this. I had to run a couple errands today, and it was such a pleasure to drive around with the windows down and the radio on.

I'm trying to get a couple layouts done for the CK Idea Annual call--deadline today of course. It's been a long time since I've scrapped for a CK call, and I'm finding it just as creatively stifling as ever! Seeing something I made in print always sparks the spirit, though--makes me want to keep trying.

Layout.

I scrapped one of my rose pictures the other night, just because I couldn't wait any longer. I love Rhonna Farrer's new papers and rub-ons, so I used those. I think they were just made for this picture!

I also made my own printer paper block by printing a poem on a white crackle paper. It's from "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time" by Robert Herrick. The opening line, which may or may not be legible on my layout, is "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, Old Time is still a'flying; And that same flower that smiles today, Tomorrow will be dying."

Which seems like a truthful sentiment, if not perhaps profound...until you read the rest of the poem and see that what's he saying is. "Hey all you young hotties who are saving it--you need to get laid now, 'cause you ain't getting any younger. And by the way, how 'bout it?"

At least that's what I got from it. Heh. I think Herrick was a player.