Wow!! I need to do this more.

Hello everyone,

It's been a crazy few weeks here and I can't believe I haven't posted since September!  That is terrible.  There have been little boys with colds, Halloween, Remembrance Day and lots of regular days in between.

I talked in my last post about how I am trying to loose weight and get fitter, that has continued with a few interruptions because of sick munchkins. I started taking a Zumba class which I absolutely love but am going to have to find a new time because Thing 2 now has swimming lessons during the same time... that was a scheduling mistake on my part. I also had two sessions with a personal trainer who provided me with a couple of great programs so I am been doing a lot more strength training and about 30 minutes of cardio instead of up to an hour.  I can already feel the difference in my muscles and my trainer noticed a difference after six weeks. 

I said that I would post a before photo in the hopes of holding myself accountable.  So here it goes....

Left: On the treadmill after a hard 20 minute hill workout that I found on the Instragram feed for Livy Love.  Right: the dreaded before photo.

Hopefully I will be able to schedule a few more training sessions as I found it very helpful and motivating but the $64 price tag isn't great.

I have also been doing a lot of work trying to catch up on my Project Life.  I kind of have a love - hate relationship going with Project Life.  2014 is my first year doing it, I decided once we found out that we were moving that it would be neat to try.  I am finding that it takes up too much of my creative time and actually stresses me out.  I have decided that next year for sure I will just do a monthly highlight layout.  I am spending less time worrying about making it all embellished and just getting the photos and stories in.  I have completed up to October 4 which has me over the moon!  Only a month behind, if I can get all caught up I will be able to do traditional scrapbooking with all the kits I have piled up.  I can't wait!!!

Alright, time to Project Life for 30 minutes before off to get Thing 1 and take him to swimming lessons.

Hope you have a wonderful day!
Gwynn

Hello!

Wow I can't believe it has been so long since my last post but then really so much has been happening here at my house that I definitely haven't made this a priority.  The times they are a changing!! If you have been following my blog (or my previous 3 posts..oops) you know that my family relocated this spring.  We are now an hour away from my in-laws and only two and half  hours including a ferry ride from my parents!! Love this after living more than 10 hours away by car for the past five and a half years.  We are loving our new home though there are lots of things that still need to get done.  The previous owners didn't show this house a lot of love which is sad really because it is a great house.  Unfortunately I am not that handy and my poor hubby works full time as well as working as a tutor for his professional organization.  Oh and he travels a LOT for work.  Needless to say our list of things to get done is slow going.  If the house is exactly how we want it within the next six months I will be pretty impressed with us.

With this move I have committed to staying home until our youngest son is in school which happens September 2015.  I was supposed to stay at home with the boys after we had AJ but I couldn't handle it.  I wasn't having fun and the boys definitely were not either.  I don't know if it was the age they were at or the place I was at in life but it just was not working.  I was lucky and found a great part time job after working as a casual full time for seven months. Now I have been home with the boys since March 1 and I LOVE it!  They are so much fun!

This was outside Telus World of Science in Vancouver in June.

As part of staying home I have made a commitment to myself to start exercising more, my goal is five days a week and trying to be more healthy in general including more home cooked meals and snacks.  I really want to cut out the crap out of our diets.  I have signed up for a gym and this coming week my goal is 4 days at the gym.  I am also thinking about trying my hand a baking bread.  I know the gym and fresh baked break don't really go together but I am going to try a whole wheat blend and see how I do.  I will share the recipe and results with you once I have done it.  I am also going to do something even scarier and share a before photo. 

The other big thing I have wanted to do for a long time and that was the original reason for starting this blog is to scrapbook MORE and share my work.  I love to scrapbook and know that there are millions of men and women out there that love to do it was well.  I may not been the best at it but I want to share.  Most of my time this summer has been spent trying to catch up with Project Life something that I started doing this year...hopefully I get all caught up once both boys are in a school and then I can get back to my first love of 12 x 12 full layouts.  I need to find balance in this area.

Okay, the before photo will come sometime this week after I get hubby to take a picture.  I will leave you with some fun photos from our summer!

Hope you have a wonderful day!
Gwynn

Statue garden at Coombs.

Good morning!
Things have been pretty quiet here for the past week just waiting out our moving dates. As a result I have had some time to scrapbook! I was inspired by Creative Scrappers sketch 265 so I thought I would give it a try.

I used my latest Memory Workshop and a couple of things like washi tape from my stash. (That I can find because most of it is packed.)

Hope you have a wonderful day!
Gwynn

Wow and the house is SOLD!

Well it has been a few months since I lasted posted and lots has happened.  We listed our house on December 1, 2013 and it was officially sold on March 31, 2014!  This is great because while down on the island for spring break and our "search and view" we found a house that while it isn't perfect will definitely work for us for the next few years. 


One of the things that was important to me during this process was to keep Thing 1 and Thing 2 really involved.  Thing 1 is in grade one and we know he has a hard time with transition.  We took them both to the new house and showed them where their rooms would be, checked out the cool backyard, there is a playhouse with bunk beds!!  We also drove around the neighbourhood showing them the places that we will regularly visit like the elementary school, local parks, grocery stores, daddy's office and the recreation center.

This year I decided to take the plunge into Project Life as it has been and will continue to be a year of big changes for us.  I feel like I am doing a pretty good job of keeping on top of things.  I picked up a a journal at Target and I sit down at the end of each week and document what happened.  I am also using the Collect App on my phone which has been a great reference point for me.  I might even send those photos off to Persnickety Prints at some point.

When Chris and I were out with the Realtor she printed off the property information sheet and then a few of the photos from the listing.  I thought it would be a neat idea to document the house search for Project Life and I think it came out pretty well.  Check out the photos below!

These are all of the 11 houses that we looked at, we loved #10 out of 11!

These are the inside photos from the printout we were provided with.  

I think this was a fun way to document the experience.

Hopefully I will get back to writing more frequently now that life seems to be coming together.

Have a wonderful day!!
Gwynn

More big news... We are on the move!

Good morning everyone!
Well it has been a crazy few days around here. On Tuesday my hubby accepted a transfer to Courtenay, BC.  We are very excited about this for a number of reasons but also sad to be leaving our incredible group of friends here in a Prince George.

Our biggest motivation for accepting the transfer is being closer to family. We will be any an hour of so away from both sets of parents and one of my sisters. After being 10 hours away for the past five years we are so excited to be closer. Plus, no more -30 in the winter and not nearly as much snow!

I had a Stella & Dot party on Friday night with some of my close friends and it was so much fun to just hang out drinking wine and looking at pretty things.

Saturday the realtors came through quickly to get a feel for the house, they are back today to take photos and get the house listed. We absolutely love this house and hope that someone else does too. If we could be in Courtenay for February that would be awesome.

On a Scrapbooking note I have re-purposed my 2012 December daily that I never finished into my 2013 December daily. I have decided that I want to do 31 days instead of 25 so I will have to get a few more page protectors... Hopefully Kimi has some at Scrap Therapy which re-opened yesterday at its new location. I can't wait to check it out!

Alright, last swimming lesson of the year in an hour better get ready to go! I hope you all have a restful Sunday.
Gwynn

Wow that was fast!!

Hi everyone,

Well I got some great news today! After suffering with carpal tunnel symptoms for more than a year now I am finally going to have surgery. Left hand done December 17th (Happy Birthday mom!) and the right hand done on January 6th. I am super happy about these dates because our parents are both coming for visits around each of these dates so we will have some extra help.

Not a lot of Scrapbooking going on because of some clean up and re-organization we are trying to do downstairs. But tonight after dinner Thing 1 and I stayed and coloured at the table. It was so much fun it just chill out and relax with him. We both love colouring. Love that six year old, my mini me in many ways.

Contemplating ordering the Crop & Create winter kit but that $51.25 cost kills me when I know ScrapTherapy my favourite store on the plant is about to re-open after their move. She will have a TON of awesome products all new that I will love and want. What is a girl to do!?!

Hope you have a great night I am crawling into bed with my book and electric blanket!  It is super cold here, -21 with the windchill today.

G

Good morning everyone!
One thing you will quickly learn about me if you don't already know me is that my boys including the dog are all early risers and my husband is NOT.  I would love to sleep in and I sometimes sneak back upstairs as the boys are old enough now to be given a snack, drink and NetFlix Kids for an hour. But this has become my favourite time to checkout all the blogs I follow, watch new process videos from Mercy Tiara and lately older ones as apparently we are up early a lot! LOL
I have been scrapbooking for about four years now and I absolutely love it. I have always been pretty creative, I took art all through high school and had great dreams of being an artist. Life just doesn't give me enough time to paint or draw right now. Scrapbooking lets me play with paper, inks, embellishments and so much more while preserving our little family's history.
"The boys",  "Thing 1 & Thing 2" or Callum and Alister are all boy! They love bugs, digging in the dirt, riding bikes and scooters, eating and tuning out my voice. Callum is six and in grade one. After a rocky start last year he is rocking school. He has started to get into video games which I don't love but I know it is part of the deal. But seriously if I hear "I want Skylanders Swap Force for Christmas!!" one more time I might cry. Lego, Lego and more Lego is his other passion which I fully support. He loves to put together whatever the kit is and then almost immediately make something of his own creation. Love it!  Alister is my baby but he isn't a baby anymore and he is actually a really big three almost four year old. He is only six inches shorter than his big brother which makes life interesting. "No they aren't twins."  AJ loves Thomas the Tank engine and trains in general. His train obsession works to my advantage because his trains are downstairs where my scrapbook room is located. I am always happy to go downstairs so he can play.
Okay, time to get ready for swimming lessons. I will post some layouts later today.
Thanks for reading!!
Gwynn