Having Children

Having children

I have been reading the magazine "MORE" and enjoying myself! The magazine's tagline is "Smart talk for smart women" but basically it's for women over forty, and I was surprised to find that I enjoy reading it very much! It's both humbling and liberating to find in the mag lots of women who are my age and much older who are doing so much wonderful exciting things with their lives!! Yippee! I'm really feeling great about being my age right now and find so much to be thankful for, I'm so blessed to be feeling this way. Thank you God!


Actually today my thoughts are on having children, inspired by these words by Karen Day, extracted from MORE mag Jul/Aug issue:

To love a child or anything this much is both courageous and ridiculous. Dread steals your breath away, then hope swells you drunk with gratitude. Everyday is a bungee jump. The intensity either kills you or saves your life on a daily basis. But on we go, having and loving our kids like there is no nuclear tomorrow. And what choice do we have?

What eloquent words! We can't help ourselves, can we? Almost everyday I swing north and south with my children.. they take so much out of me and also gives so much back! Thank you God for letting me be a mom and partake everything (the joys, worries, love, anguish, blessing) that comes with it.

What I Want To Do

What I Want To Do

The title is this week's blog challenge over at Style It Studio. A fascinating challenge! You must go over and check it out here: http://www.styleitstudio.com/blog/

You will see what I came up with, when I sat down to mull over it. I told myself to put down only things that are within possible reach of me actually doing them in the near future, and I surprised myself! It felt strange focusing on myself for a change, refeshing and I enjoyed it. Who knows, I might actually get to some of the items on my list!!

Journaling reads: Take a dance class, Exercise consistently, Enjoy my boys, not just mother them, Visit Japan and Tokyo, Have a 2nd career that will last me till 80, Read a good novel, Keep holding hands with my hubby, Know and love God more, Leave a scrapbook legacy, Repaint our home and getthose new curtains! Eat Healthily, Go out more with my girlfriends, Make mosaic art again, Stop screaming at my kids, Get a pedicure
Credits: "i" Alpha by LHabis, "To" alpha by Misty Casto, Fonts: Pegasus HK and Adler.Glitter heart and brown paper from Digital Design Essentials' Shabby Shack, Ribbon by Lisa Marie from Style It Studio, Chenile twist, tag (ghettoinkies), background papers all by Sara Robinson available from Style It Stuido.
Frankly what I really want to do right now is enjoy my hour or so of quiet blogging and scrapping, it had been a tough evening with one son trying last minute to finish his project for school tomorrow, and the other crying the entire evening for his brother to go play with him....it can be so trying sometimes... the joys and pains of parenting.
I have decided, that when a layout works for me, I'll share it in the form of a template, they take very little time to do up, and it's my way of sharing and giving back. So here it is:Do say hi if you download, better yet, link me up to your layout if you used it, I'd LOVE to see them! You can get this free download in the store here

My first CT

My first CT!!

Yes, I got on my first CT! I never did have a CT when I was a designer, because there was such a great bunch of GDS site supreme team doing our layouts, but now I'm on the other side, and I know it's just gonna be fun!

I'm on lovely Sarah Robinson's CT. She's just started a cool new store called Style it Studio, and I'm one of the Stylin Sisters! How cool is that!

Here's my first layout with her stuff, don't you just love those frames??? I find them funky and fun, just perfect for my boys' layout, not too sweety pie, yet not too grunge or punk (I'm sure I'll have enough of those when they are teens), and they do go so well with Sarah's Alpha and Paper sets! Here's the link http://www.styleitstudio.com/store/index.php?main_page=index to go to Style it Studio.

Journaling reads:

In this picture you just had your spectacles for maybe a few months. You were only five when we discovered that you had astigmatism of 300 degrees in both eyes!! They told us it was there probably from birth and you had gotten so used to blurred vision you did not know the world any other way! Besides the guilt we felt for not knowing earlier, we felt sorry that you had to wear the glasses every hour of the waking day and you were only five! But as you can see here, you took to them wonderfully, the world must have seemed suddenly clearer and better, you didn’t want to take them off! You even looked cute in them, and we‘re glad you get on so well with your new lifelong friend.

Innonence

INNOCENCE
Some days I wish my children are grown and matured and I do not need to teach or worry about them anymore, but mostly I'm so afraid of them growing up so quickly and losing their childish innocence that is so adorable, and lovable. And mostly I just can't handle the thought of dealing with teenagers yet!!! My eight and ten year olds are precocious and too smart for their own good, they think they know everything, but ah, we had such a good laugh at the HK Jungle Cruise I just had to record it :

Journaling reads:
When you’re grown up and read this believe me it is all true !! On the jungle cruise, you were both amazed and marveled at all the animals and sights. You laughed along with the guide and us, then got all serious. One of you asked the other, were the monkeys real? And launched into discussion. Finally you both declared that only the elephants, and crocs were real, so proud that you were not tricked by Disney.
It’s true! Love you, innocent, adorable, mine!
Everything is from Weeds & Wildflowers' Creating Beauty kit, and the "Cute" tag is by Christina Renee,what great work they do!
And here's the template from the layout. If you like it, leave me a comment!
You can download it here:
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A Nook of My Own

A Nook of My Own


From a lovely book "Simple Abundance" by Sarah Ban Breathnach given to me by my oldest and best friend:


In solitude we give passionate attention to our lives, to our memories, to the details around us - Virginia Woolf


I live in a medium sized apartment with 3 bed rooms with my dh, two sons and my parents in law. I'm not complaining at all, I'm blessed, in my tiny land scarce country. But there is no nook of my own for creating, as suggested by Sarah in her book. After reading this particular page, I look at the table I share with my boys, right this moment full of papers, a beany bear, dictionary, stationery, tissue box, my cheque book... ahhhh, I feel like laughing out loud at my nook for creating. But yet, it's here, on the computer I too share with both boys, after they are in bed every night, that I enjoy an hour or maybe more of creativity. I'm not disturbed by the untidiness or the clutteredness of the "nook" at all, once I start, I am in a zone so to speak, previously designing, now almost all the time for scrapping all my memories, and also for blogging and recording anything I like here. It's great, and I'm grateful, for I am able to "give passionate attention to our lives, to our memories, to the details around us."



Journaling reads: It’s amazing what you can do together in the ten minutes we were“stuck” together on the Ocean Park Ferris Wheel.Making each other nervous, doing kiddie antics, playing with Miffy..... just having fun..... love family time. Dec 06
I used Corina Nielson's Be Kind paper and frames by Fernlili - they are both my favourites.

COOL

COOL

I really loved how this turned out! Jared has been watching his favorite Snoopy VCDs everyday again, he especially loves the parts where the characters break into song and dance, "jazz" he tells me... and of course he'll jump up and join in the dance. He reads all the Charlie Brown comics he can get his hands on, breaks out uncontrollably in laughter every now and then. We love it that he has this great sense of humour, and we are so glad he has these wholesome cartoons to enjoy! Here's Jared in HK's tiny Snoopy Park.I made this template from the layout, in case anyone is interested, cos I kinda like how it worked! It's my first template actually!

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Gigantic Difference

Thank you so much!!

But first I'm excited about this so I want to ask what you think of this quote? I saw it in an issue of Real Simple yesterday and immediately had to put one of my photos to it. No time to even properly scrap it! And to think, Marlene Dietrich said it! It's a wonderful reminder to me that the Lord blesses us richly in many ways!




And back to thanking all of you! Thank you so much for your wonderful, kind, lovely comments and well-wishes, I'm so blessed by them! Some of you are special ladies I know from GDS but some of you are total strangers and all of you stopped by to leave a kind word - how wonderful is that? This digi-community is a blessing indeed. Thank you! Please keep in touch with me at GDS or at my blog!

Since I've stopped designing, I've completed "cataloging" all my digi-kits (I print out previews) that I've accumulated over the past year, bought and free - as I've mentioned the amount of stuff shared out there is fantastic, and I intend to chip in from time to time too!

And here's one layout I just completed: some of our many beach photos - I think we are beach bums!! Do any of you have the same feeling as me, that regardless what expensive far flung holiday we might be able to bring our children to, they seem to enjoy the simple pleasures of the beach the most? The children have much to teach us about contentment!It's based on SimplySarah's template - isn't she great? you can get to her blog from here: http://simplysarahdesigns.blogspot.com/. And that fantastic paper is from Laura Reid's Create Wings - unbelievably beautiful - get them at ScrapArtist.


And now, here's the last freebie I will put up at GDS as a designer, another mini-elements kit I prepared for the previous daily download program, but never put in the store, it's up at GDS. You'll need to log into GDS, the link to the post where you can get the attached file is right here: http://www.godigitalscrapbooking.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2661


Lots of other fabulous stuff in the same forum area from the other designers too! And don't forget my Saying-Goodbye sale is still on till 15 August - everything at 60% off! Here's the link to my store: http://www.godigitalscrapbooking.com/shop/index.php?main_page=index&manufacturers_id=10&sort=7&page=1

Saying Good Bye

Saying Good Bye

This is a bittersweet post... I've thought and prayed, wavered for quite a while, but finally, it's decided, I'm saying good-bye to my life as a designer ... sob sob... it's been such a ride, this past year, and especially the last 7 months at GDS, who'd have thought, me a designer!!



I loved it, taking an idea, a few colors, playing with it all and coming up with something beautiful (at least to me!)! I was in creative heaven so to speak, walking, thinking, dreaming design ideas all the time. But unfortunately it was also terribly distracting... especially because I also work outside the home, there was no way I could cope on a long term basis and still focus on all the other parts of my life as I would like to. I feel that the Lord is leading me to this decision, so that I can put my focus back on my family, work, bible study class, sunday school, scrapping, and also, more sleep ! haha!
Click here to go to the store: http://www.godigitalscrapbooking.com/shop/index.php?main_page=index&manufacturers_id=10&sort=7&page=3


So here I am, saying a reluctant goodbye...I know i'll still design, for my own layouts, for sharing, and Holly at GDS has graciously said I'm welcome to be a guest designer from time to time, bless her!! So the door is not closed, just a chapter I guess.. that makes this easier. :)

Well so much for all my rambling, thanks for reading so far, in case any of you like to pick up my stuff, everything in the store is 60% off till 15 August !!

Click here to go to the store: http://www.godigitalscrapbooking.com/shop/index.php?main_page=index&manufacturers_id=10&sort=7&page=2And here's a toolkit I made earlier but had not put up in the store, I may have quit selling, but I can still share them. Enjoy and do leave me a comment if you like it :) Sorry this is no longer available