The Simple Woman’s Daybook 2.9 February 9, 2010
Posted by Erin in Simple Woman's Daybook, randomness.add a comment
I enjoy reading my friend Monica’s Daybook posts every week, so I finally decided to play along!
Outside my window… there is oodles of snow!!
I am thinking... that I should probably be asleep. But I really enjoy this quiet time when everyone else in the house is sleeping!
I am thankful… for electricity and other modern conveniences! So thankful that we kept power last weekend when so many didn’t.
I am wearing…. mismatched jammies, as usual.
I am creating… nothing at the moment. But, earlier this evening I did complete a layout about my “first crush” in the Sixth Grade. That was rather amusing!
I am going... to go crazy if these kids don’t get back to school soon!
I am reading… The Fiery Cross by Diana Gabaldon. Book Five in the Outlander series. For the second time (yes, I’m insane!).
I am hoping… that I’ll be able to get out of the house and get the kids to their dentist appointments Thursday afternoon.
I am hearing… the wind outside my window and water running in the fish tank.
From the kitchen… lot of dishes waiting to be done in the morning (or whenever I get to them tomorrow).
Around the house… piles of laundry that need to be washed, dried, folded, and put away… as usual. (This could be my answer to this prompt EVERY week!!)
One of my favorite things… curling up with Lizzie the Evil Rat Dog, when she’s nice and calm and loving… and I wonder how she ever got that evil reputation of hers!!
A few plans for the rest of the week… signing Damon up for flag football (he’s so excited!). Probably doing some grocery shopping. Skype scrapping with some friends this weekend, with any luck.
From my picture journal… Nick shoveling. There’s been lots of that going on this week!
Click here for details on how to take part in The Simple Woman’s Daybook.
The luge February 7, 2010
Posted by Erin in Damon and Avery, Nickolas, winter/snow.5 comments
I keep joking about Nick digging a luge in our backyard. But I’m serious.
It starts in our front/side yard, up by the street,
then comes down into this man/Nick-made banking turn
and then it shoots off diagonally through the rest of the backyard, ending with a couple of little jumps.
Nick carved out a little spot behind the turn (that Avery kept referring to as “the bleachers”), where I could stand and attempt to get some videos of those fools. I never did learn how to embed videos on this blog (if it’s even possible), so just click on the hyperlinks below to see clips of Damon and Avery, the sledding stars!
Avery (It’s easier to see the funny end to Avery’s run in full-screen mode.)
Obviously, the Witschey luge and the 2 feet of snow that made it possible are entertaining all of us this weekend!!
A new blog project February 7, 2010
Posted by Erin in Scrappy Deals, blog, scrapbooking.1 comment so far
I think I’ve probably lost my mind, but I recently started a new project.
I love to blog. And I love to scrapbook. So I’m kind of combining the two with the Scrappy Deals blog.
There is a story behind this new venture… other than the fact that I’ve been without work for too long and I’m so bored that I’m ready to shoot myself! ASIDE from that, though… Not long ago, I volunteered on one of my online scrapbooking groups to be their official “enabler.” This means that once a week I comb the Internet looking for current sales, promotions, new products of interest, etc., and I then share some of these findings with my scrappy friends, hopefully “enabling” them to spend their hard-earned money on scrapbooking goodies.
And I’ve found this to be a rather frustrating task. I have dozens of scrapbooking stores and blogs bookmarked, and I spend countless hours trudging through all of them once a week… looking for fun things to share with my group. And I keep thinking, “why isn’t there ONE place where I can go, to find all (or at least a lot of!) the current deals??” There very well may be such a place, but I sure as heck haven’t found it in my travels… and I’ve looked! Believe me, I’ve looked.
So, my friend Katie, in her infinite wisdom, suggested that I create such a place. And, because I’m insane, I decided to do just that.
So now, I’m still trudging through a million Web sites, looking for deals… but I’m then making the task even more complicated and time-consuming by spending countless hours copy/pasting these deals to my new Scrappy Deals blog… and trying to do so in a halfway organized fashion. It’s making my head spin a little… but, I am actually having fun with it.
Starting from scratch is taking some time… because there are LOTS of current deals/sales going on at the moment. I’m trying to add a few new posts each day. And I think that, once I get “caught up” with things, adding only the new deals each day won’t be quite so arduous! Check it out and let me know what you think (and bookmark it!).
We have snow!! February 6, 2010
Posted by Erin in Damon and Avery, winter/snow.add a comment
Finally.
I’ve been whining and moaning for over a week now because my oceanfront friends have gotten more snow than we have, here in the HILLS of Wild, Wonderful West Virginia. And there’s just something very wrong about that, isn’t there??
But, today, all is right in my snowy, hilly world. It started snowing yesterday afternoon and kept it up for about 24 hours, leaving us with about 18 inches of snow. Nick has been busy shoveling and digging a luge through the yard for the kids to sled down. He also shoveled for the old lady next door… she pays in peanut butter fudge, so we like to do work for her!!
I went out with the kids for a few minutes this morning and snapped a few snowy pics. The snow was so deep that Damon had to trudge through first, and Avery followed in his path. Otherwise, I don’t think Avery would’ve gotten very far!!
We moved almost exactly two years ago. And the kids still talk sometimes about missing Maryland and living by the beach. I don’t think they were missing the beach today, though. They were pretty darn happy trudging through all of that snow!!
Six-word memoirs February 4, 2010
Posted by Erin in Fun stuff.1 comment so far
My friend Melissa shared this article with our Mom’s Group yesterday. And I love it so much that I just have to share it here.
As most of you probably know, even if you only know me from reading this blog, I tend to be a little on the wordy side. So this is a huge challenge for me. Way worse than Twitter, even! If you’ve been living under a rock (I know some of you have!) and aren’t familiar with Twitter, each “tweet” you post cannot exceed 140 characters. Even that is a challenge for me… which is why I still blog more than I tweet!
But six words?? Yikes.
It could take a while for me to agonize over this one.
Which six words would you choose?
Please send ibuprofen! February 3, 2010
Posted by Erin in Damon.1 comment so far
Damon finished up his birthday shopping last night. He told us that he wanted to get video games, which was no shock.
But, Nick had to stop by Lowes last night for something Pinewood Derby-related (I thought we were done with that for another year, but apparently we’re not!)… and once we got in there, Damon decided he wanted to use his birthday money to buy… TOOLS, of all things.
Tools. I was so puzzled. I had no idea what this child thought he was going to do with a case full of tools. And I told him that. But he pissed and moaned and cried and threw FITS… and finally convinced me that he’d rather have tools than video games. So, tools it was!
Nick and I were actually quite pleased that he chose something other than a video game… believe it or not, we do TRY to encourage things other than vegging in front of the television, controller in hand. But he’s always been a video game junkie… since he was old enough to hold a controller. So, yay, Damon is interested in something other than video games!!
That excitement was extremely short-lived.
After two days of listening to much hammering coming from our basement, I’m ready to shoot myself. Damon hammered until bedtime last night. And as soon as he got home from school today, the hammering started all over again. My head is POUNDING!!
I told Nick tonight that I really wanted to go buy Damon a damn video game, with my own money, in the hopes that it would distract him from the hammering… for just a minute or two.
My head. It hurts. Make. The. Hammering. Stop.
Video games are NOT such a bad thing. I promise.
Sketchy Thursdays 1.28 February 1, 2010
Posted by Erin in Sketchy Thursdays, scrapbooking.6 comments
Look out, I’ve done this challenge two weeks in a row!! (I really, really need to find work soon!)
You can find this week’s Sketchy Thursdays challenge here.
And, here’s my layout based on the fun sketch.
I also included another scrappy challenge from Scrapfreak, which was to create your own flower. Several different crafty tutorials were posted, and I chose this book page flower. It was very, VERY hard for this bookworm to rip pages out of a book… even though it was an old, icky, totally-not-my-thing-kinda book that I knew I’d never, ever read… it was still hard for me to destroy it. I’m slowly getting over it, though, because I think the flower looks darn cute on this layout!
At nine years old… January 31, 2010
Posted by Erin in uncategorized.2 comments
You love Legos.
You hate having your picture taken.
You are still a grumpy, moody, emotionally charged kid… but I do think you’re learning to control it more, which is a good thing (for all of us!).
You continue to love video games.
You let your little sister beat you up every now and then.
You like to read. (Diary of a Wimpy Kid is your current favorite, even though you’re reading Twilight here.)
You always need a haircut.
You love my iPod.
You are the pickiest eater on the planet.
You miss your friends and your school in Maryland.
You believe in Santa (or at least you SAY that you do!).
You love to play in the snow.
You adore your sister, but only when you think no one’s looking!
You don’t look a thing like that newborn boy I held in my arms for the first time 9 years ago…
January 31, 2001
and I couldn’t love you more if I tried.
January 31, 2010
Happy Ninth Birthday, Damon.
Pinewood Derby, Part II January 30, 2010
Posted by Erin in Damon, Scouts.add a comment
Derby Day was a little on the crazy side, like we knew it would be.
Of course, Nick DJed the night before and didn’t get home ’til around 4am… I didn’t wake him until 10:30 and the Derby started at 11, oops! I didn’t realize he wanted to get up earlier, get some more work done on Damon’s car, and get to the church early. So we were running and rushing to get there on time.
When we got there, the line was out the door of the church. The line for registration and inspection of the cars. Inspection that Nick was supposed to be in charge of!
Here’s my view from the stage, of the registration/inspection line… and you can barely see Nick back there (behind the light, in the Pittsburgh hat), hard at work.
Only three boys from Damon’s Bear den participated this year. So I took pics of each of them setting their cars.
Damon…
Mason…
and Skyler…
Skyler won!!
Damon came in last, and he wasn’t very happy about that… but he got over it quickly and enjoyed watching the rest of the racers compete.
The top four in each den “place” and receive trophies at the Blue and Gold Banquet in March. So, uhhh, all of the Bears will be getting trophies! We have the smallest den in the pack, but I think that makes the boys that much closer. Aren’t they cute? Ignore Damon’s blue mouth… ring pops. Snack bar. Leave it to my children to have the blue, sticky mouths!!
The Derby was a huge success… and Nick and I are both glad that it’s over for another year. Now we can take a break for a while before we start hosting workshops to build next year’s cars!!!
Derby 2010, Part I January 29, 2010
Posted by Erin in Scouts.1 comment so far
My house has been Pinewood Derby Central for the past month. Every weekend, little Cub Scouts and their parents have been invading my home to work on their Derby cars in the basement. For me, it’s been a virtual nightmare. Dogs barking, kids running through my house, parents not paying attention to their kids running through my house, etc.
So, I’m positively thrilled that this weekend is the annual Pinewood Derby! That means I’ll get my house back on the weekends (until this time next year, anyway).
Tonight, we kicked off Derby weekend with the Friends and Family race. It’s just what it sounds like… friends and family members are invited to race cars that they’ve made. And the Scouts are allowed to make a second car to race at the F&F race, just for fun.
Nick, Damon, and Avery all had cars for tonight’s race. I ended up racing Nick’s car, however, because he was in charge of the official scoreboard and eliminations (and, trust me, that’s a lot harder than it sounds!).
Here are some of the cars, lined up and ready to go after they were inspected. There were 26 cars total.
You don’t have to look very closely to find Avery’s car. Mine/Nick’s is the green one to the left of the AVERY mobile, and Damon’s is the yellow one next to that.
Here’s Damon’s car, along with its competitors, waiting at the gate.
Damon and his car both moved too fast for me to get any pics of them together, unfortunately.
But, as usual, Avery was much more cooperative in the photo department…
She won!!
And, of course, there are no pictures of me serving as Nick’s proxy. Why on earth would anyone think to pick up a camera and take a picture of me?? No, of course they wouldn’t. But I did race the car… and it raced well!!! We were undefeated for a long time, until the very end.
At the end, there were three girls standing.
It was a fun evening. Tomorrow, we’ll return for the Pack race, where the Scouts will race their “official” 2010 Derby cars. I’ve volunteered to work the snack bar, but hopefully I’ll get to sneak out and snap a few pics of Damon’s race. Stay tuned for Derby 2010, Part II.
