Here is my entry for Janelle's sketch this week. I used a photo of Griffin from last year- the day I discovered that he apparently likes watermelon.

For Beth...a little John Sheppard

Since I won't get to watch any Stargate: Atlantis until July when season 4 is released to DVD, I thought I'd have a little John Sheppard fest on the blog.

Everyone sigh together now. He's just pretty.




Eeeew, okay, not the green guy, but the guy holding the gun on the green guy...



How do they get his hair to do that?!?!?!?!


Must have the P90 shots...

Still stuck on Lifehouse...

I can't get enough of it- I love this band! And this isn't a new thing- I've listened to them for at least 7 years now. I'm gonna have to find one of their concerts somewhere close by and go to it.

In the meantime, go buy this song on iTunes or something!!! It totally rawks. :-) I know it's not new- when I was in Colorado last year it used to be on the muzac at the gym constantly. I think I must completely associate it with working out now. No wonder I have this sudden urge to go to the gym!

"First Time"

We're both looking for something
We've been afraid to find
It's easier to be broken
It's easier to hide

Looking at you,holding my breath,
For once in my life,I'm scared to death,
I'm taking a chance,letting you inside.

Feeling alive all over again,
As deep as the sky, under my skin
Like being in love, she says
For the first time
Maybe I'm wrong,
But I'm feeling right where I belong
With you tonight
Like being in love
To feel for the first time

The world that I see inside you
Waiting to come to life
Waking me up to dreaming
Reality in your eyes

Looking at you,
Holding my breath,
For once in my life
I'm scared to death,
I'm taking a chance,
Letting you inside.

I'm feeling alive all over again
As deep as the sky that's under my skin
Like being in love, she says, for the first time
Maybe I'm wrong, I'm feeling right
Where I belong with you tonight
Like being in love to feel for the first time

We're crashing
Into the unknown
We're lost in this
But it feels like home

I'm feeling alive all over again
As deep as the sky that's under my skin
Like being in love, she says, for the first time
Maybe I'm wrong, I'm feeling right
Where I belong with you tonight
Like being in love to feel for the first time

Request: Rock Band or Guitar Hero, Lifehouse Edition

Really, seriously, there needs to be a Lifehouse Edition of either Rock Band or Guitar Hero. I've been listening to their latest album, "Who We Are" at work today, and I have to stop myself from wanting to play air drums along with "First Time." I'm sure my coworkers are grateful.

How can you *not* want to sing and play along with this stuff? I'd never be able to turn that game off! And since the creators of Guitar Hero have announced that they will be adding a drum set and microphone and the creators of Rock Band have said they are releasing a Wii version of the game in June, this should all be totally doable on my favorite platform.

I'll take a Lifehouse version over Aerosmith any day!

Sketch This- Week 51 Challenge

Here is my entry for the SketchThis challenge this week. I just love Janelle's sketches, and this is my first time to enter!

The photos are of a bleeding heart plant in my yard...still playing with the new camera.

Required Reading

I was so pleased to see that this arrived last weekend while I was out of town. It's the last book in the cycle.

I hope they start another cycle soon, or I'll be suffering from Star Wars withdrawals! This series has been a page turner, and I expect that this last book will be, as well. Here's what Del Rey's web site has to say about it...

"No war can last forever. Now, in the long and punishing battle between the defiant champions of the New Jedi Order and the juggernaut that is the Galactic Alliance, the endgame is finally at hand. With so much lost—and nothing less than the course of the future still at stake—here can be no turning back. No matter the consequences."

Ooooh, ominous. :-)

I was originally supposed to be driving to Pearlington with another volunteer tomorrow, but the plans changed (yes, Jennifer, flexibility!!) and now I will be riding down in a motorcoach. I think that's actually a good thing since it'll give me a chance to read my new book!

New Camera Case

I ordered a custom camera case from a seller on Etsy (http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5278601) and it arrived while I was out of town last week. I'm so thrilled with the results! I wanted something different- something that was definitely me. I think I found it...isn't this fabric gorgeous?!?!? Jackie did a great job- the quality is top notch.

It's got lots of lens pockets...for all those lenses that I *don't* have. I'm so lazy...I just take all my photos with the 18-200mm VR. I would like to get a good macro lens some time, though. In the meantime, these pockets are great for holding battery packs, chargers, and small furry animals. Err, eh, yeah.

Ummmm, I seriously have no idea how this got in there...really, I would never, ever read such...such good stuff. :-)

As you can see, the pockets are great for holding books, too. Like the D300's manual. Not that I ever need to actually *read* the manual. Ahem.

Catching up on some layouts

These are a bunch that I made at the last crop at Archivers (pictured a few posts below). These are the pages that make people ask if there are ever people in my photographs!

First up, photos from the Denver Zoo. I had just bought my 18-200 VR lens when I took this trip, and I shot nearly 500 photos. I think I had 100 of them printed. And I think I will be scrapping them for the rest of my life.

I had never made caramel apples before last fall. I think they turned out pretty well for my first attempt...and of course I had to take pictures!

Finally, this is foxglove growing in the garden last summer. I'm not thrilled with how this turned out, but here it is.

For the love of Wii

I probably hadn't seriously played video games for 6 or 7 years before I got the Wii. I loved playing the old NES, Sega Genesis, and lots of computer games, but when the PlayStation era hit I had to stop playing. Something about the 3D graphics just made me ill- I'd feel nauseous after just a few minutes.

When the Wii came out, I doubted I'd be able to play. But for some reason, it agreed with me! So, after playing with my brother's for a weekend to make sure I could handle it, I bought one. And a stack of games. And lots of controllers. And a couple of extra Nunchuks (cuz you gotta have those for boxing). And now I'm a total addict. Dance, Dance Revolution and Guitar Hero are my favorites, with Lego Star Wars and Donkey Kong Barrel Blast ranking right up there. And I'm still trying to get the hang of Smash Bros. Brawl. It's fun, but I don't quite understand it.

So when I had an extra Toys R Us gift card sent to me and they offered a printable $5 coupon, I went for a new game. MarioKart. Dad and I have been playing it all weekend- too much fun!!

Now I'm anxiously awaiting the release of the Wii Fit and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. Because I always wanted to be a Jedi. A really fit Jedi. :)

Cropping at Archivers

This is a typical Friday night for me when I'm working in Colorado. I got to Archiver's for Scrap Mania and play all night. They serve dinner and snacks and drinks, so all I have to do is sit and scrap!

My table gets pretty messy after a few hours...

And then, just outside the crop room, is this whole world of scrapping goodies...

I just love this- all those yummy ink colors all lined up and organized. It totally appeals to my OCD side.

Just one more photo of yumminess, I promise! All this MM Noteworthy stuff. I wanted to buy it all. I was so good...I didn't buy any of it.

Catching up on some layouts

I made several layouts almost two weeks ago that I wanted to share here. I've got a new method of packing for crops now- I plan every page, choose a sketch, get just the papers and embellishments I need, and then layer that stack between pieces of cardstock in a 12x12 box (that holds lots of similar stacks). It's helped me take waaaaaay less stuff to crops and get more done. Not to mention that I'm using my idea books more now that I can go through all of them and choose a sketch at home instead of just flipping through whatever I happened to take to the crop with me.

These layouts are of my birthday party at my parents' house. Mom asked what kind of part I wanted, and I said immediately "Wii Bowling and pizza!" So it was a total Wii weekend. They gave me Guitar Hero (soooooo much fun!) and I got a couple of other Wii games (Smash Bros Brawl and Lego Star Wars) along with Harry Potter books. Yeah, these people know me pretty well :-)

This layout is of my great-grandmother. She loves little stuffed animals that sing and dance, and these are some photos of her with a Easter duck that Mom and Dad bought for her.

And lastly...gorgeous Colorado in the fall. I thought I'd scrapped all my fall photos from out there last year, but I came across these four that I'd printed and not yet done anything with. So beautiful...not to mention that it gave me a chance to use that gorgeous orange flower that I'd had hanging around for, like, ever!

First Etsy Purchase

Blogs are dangerous things- not necessarily for the writer, but for the reader. Because the reader reads about what the writer just bought, and then the reader just has to go and buy one for herself. Or, at least one similar to it.

A couple of days ago someone posted a picture on their blog of this awesome camera strap they'd bought on Etsy (if you've not heard of Etsy, think of an eBay type store, except with fixed prices, just for handmade/craft items). Of course, I had to go look. And of course I had to find one that I loved.

Is it not tooooo cute?!!?!!? It's from this seller's shop (http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=7627), and she has lots of similar designs. I can't wait for it to arrive!

Cute little Japanese characters for a massive Japanese camera- the symmetry is just so...symmetrical.

PageMaps!!!

The awesome and amazing Becky Fleck has posted a new set of PageMaps this month, along with a set of SideMaps (11x8.5 horizontal layouts). I have to credit Becky for any sense of balance that most of my layouts have (because goodness knows I have no balance on my own). If you've never used one of her sketches, I highly recommend you give them a try.

Her book is great, too- I ordered it from Amazon a couple of weeks ago and have already used several of the sketches. A lot of the photos used are smaller sizes and hard to crop from a 4x6 print, but I learned how to crop a photo and resize it at the same time in Photoshop Elements and now using sketches like that is a breeze- not to mention it makes planning a page soooo much less stressful when your photos are already the right size. I'll post a tutorial at some point when I have time (and when I learn to do a screen capture in my iMac).