Read the Scriptures!

Thanks to my sister-in-law Katie for sharing this awesome scripture study help on her blog! The site www.readthescriptures.com offers preplanned or personalized scripture reading schedules. You pick one or many and they will email you your selection(s). I love this idea because I'm currently working in Primary (with the little kids) at church and since that means I don't get to go to Sunday School myself, I chose to have the preset weekly lesson scriptures sent to me so I can keep up with the grownup class. I've been wanting to get back in the habit of daily reading and this seems like the perfect thing to give me a little push. The site also has a bunch of other extra features like highlighting and stuff I haven't tried yet but it looks like they thought of everything. It also lets you form teams to be kind of a study group for discussions and stuff. Oh, and did I mention this service is totally free? Yay for free! So now I'm going to post this and go read my first day's selection. Let the spiritual nourishment begin!

Photos of Photos

The other night after I hung the Alexander and Jacob wall pictures, I decided I would hang all the other pictures I’d framed but never hung. Kevin was going to the store so I asked him to get me some more nails…


That’s a box of 300 right there. Don’t think I’ll be running out again any time soon.

Photoshop + CorelDraw = Yippie!

I tried to use my Silhouette this morning to cut out a nice big tree to put on the wall in Alexander’s room. Apparently I still have a few things to learn, however, because I set the cutting thickness too high and the vinyl ended up all twisted around.
So this afternoon, to cheer myself up, I threw together this little scrapbook-y photo.

(little test of the "colored pencil" photoshop filter)

Printed it out as a 5x7 and now I’m going to frame it and put it somewhere. Then I’m going to hug my baby because he’s being so good even though I’m sure he feels icky (had to get shots yesterday.)

Vinyl Ideas

Ok everybody, I’m officially done hanging pictures (at least for the time being.) Now I need to decide on something to do in vinyl. I have 2 walls I have ideas for and all I need from you guys is comments on which fonts you like best. Of course, Kevin hasn’t even seen any of this yet and I generally give him the right of veto if he absolutely hates something. But I’m pretty sure one of these will do the trick.

Wall #1 (Master Bedroom)

Chosen quote with font options:

I’m not 100% sure which vinyl colors I’m going to use either. The only colors I have in my possession at the moment are dark brown and red. As you can see though, I don’t have any red in my master bedroom décor so I’m thinking a gold or tan to go with the bedspread might be best for the Home part and then I’ll use the dark brown for the rest.

Wall #2 (Kitchen)

Chosen quote with the font I’m pretty sure works best:

I might try to get funky and curve the up under the clock but I’m not sure I possess those skills quite yet. And if anyone else has a better, fun, time related quote to share, I’d consider using it instead. I think I like this one best though.

Now tell me what you think!

Testing Windows Live Writer

Ok, Katie you were right, this is awesome!

Picture Hanging

I mentioned at the end of my "Project" post a couple days ago that I was going to finish the boys' walls off by hanging a bunch of pictures. Up to this point I've made Kevin hang all the pictures in the house because for some reason I didn't think I could do it right but today I sucked it up and tried. I didn't use any tools for leveling or measuring but I wanted a kind of off-center look anyway so I just eye-balled it. And I'm pretty happy with the results.

And then I was on a roll so I hung the "Family" frame in this picture.

The Brown's sign was already there but this way people who've been to our house can imagine where the new frame is. 

(Family frame from top to bottom: Kevin and me and our boys; all of Kevin's family at his sister's wedding (minus Jacob);  all of my family at my parents' house last March (Becca and I were pregnant with Gideon and Jacob) 

Not really sure how much longer this productive groove is going to last. I've even been keeping up with my diet and exercising and doing the dishes and laundry. All pretty big deals for me so that feels good. I ordered some card stock so I can play with my Silhouette a little more. I think having this crafty stuff to play with is helping me stay in a creative/homemaker-y mood. The package came today and if the boys take a nap I'll probably try to make some more pretty stuff this afternoon.

A pseudo-tutorial (ish) ...thing

One of the goals our stake presidency set for us last year was to have every family hang a copy of "The Living Christ" document in their home. So, a few months ago we had a Relief Society activity to make nice collage frame mats to hang with them. They supplied 11x14 (inner space 8x10) mat boards and Ensign magazines so we could cut out pictures of Christ to frame the document.

Well, some of the ladies put theirs together; I cut out a few pictures and then decided I would finish mine at home. Fast forward to this morning (as I said, months later) and after my tiny success with the vinyl yesterday, I found myself motivated to finally finish the frame project. 

Part of the reason I didn't finish at the activity was that I wasn't in love with enough of the pictures they had available. So I pulled out my huge stack of church pamphlets.

There are only 3 different titles in that pile; I ordered them in bulk the first year Kevin and I were married. I was jazzed but of course Kevin laughed at me. Because you can get these for free from the missionaries if you have a friend to give them to and he knew I'd never know enough people to give them all away in a million years. (And since I've given out about 4 total in the past 4 years, I guess he was right.) But now that I've found this new use for them I'll definitely be getting some more mileage out of my purchase.

I also got out my fabulously multi-functional Del Parson calendars.

I love Del Parson's artwork but since really nice art is also really expensive, I like to buy the calendars and cut out and frame the pictures. And for this project some of the little sample pictures on the back pages were a perfect fit.

After a lot of cutting and experimenting and then re-cutting new pictures (good thing I had plenty of copies) I got everything laid out the way I wanted it. Then, I busted out my spiffy orange glue stick and went to town. Took a drop of brain power to make sure everything went back in the same spot once I picked up the pictures to put glue on the back, but in the end it turned out just right.

I had actually finished the first one and put it in a frame before I realized I wanted to post pictures and then I thought it would be nice to have an extra to give as a gift, so I went ahead and made the second one.

Now I just have to figure out where in the world I'm going to hang this thing...

Project!

I've finally taken the time to experiment with my Silhouette and move forward on the idea I had for our family room wall. I decided I wanted to take the blank space on both sides of our fireplace and make a "wall" for each of our two kids. The left side for Alexander, the right for Jacob. And of course, the beauty thing about using vinyl  for their names is that if we have more kids, it will come down easily and I can do something else.
So here's my picture diary of the process.

Designing

Cutting

Transferring

Left side vinyl done!

I actually didn't love the transfer paper very much, apparently the vinyl preferred staying stuck to it rather than moving on to the wall. So I ended up just sort of peeling and pressing, very slowly. Did help keep everything lined up though so I'll give it a 5 out of 10 for serving it's purpose. Now all I have to do is finish putting up Jacob's name (the wall was dirty so I had to clean it and I'm waiting for it to dry.) And then I can start hanging pictures! Woohoo!

Morning

I'm sitting here, waiting for the sun to come up. By the time it goes back down, my house will be cleaner. I hope.

Quote of the Day

Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point.
- C. S. Lewis

Quote of the Day

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Joy of Getting!

As you all know I have been wanting a Silhouette Craft Cutter for quite some time now. I put it on my wishlist for Christmas but I thought for sure no one would actually get it for me. But then came Christmas morning. I opened my present from my mom and low and behold! A Silhouette! I literally squealed with delight!

I only got to play with it once while we were still visiting my family but now it is downstairs waiting for me to take it for a spin. I'm so excited. I haven't posted on this blog in a while but the things I'm going to make with it will help take care of some of my home decor and other goals I have on here. So I thought I'd share my thrill.
Woohoo!
Thanks Mom!