Resolution Update--Back on Track, Sort Of

I did some work in August to fix two of my resolutions that got way off track this summer. Here is an update:

I resolve to take more pictures! I did take a number of pictures in August, but this resolution is too vague to really see progress on.

I resolve to read the Bible in a year. I am happy to report that as of yesterday, I am caught up with my readings.

I resolve to read 12 Newbery Medal winners this year. I read two Newbery winners in August (to make up for the one I missed in June). I read A Single Shard and A Year Down Yonder. I enjoyed them both. My next selection will be Bud, Not Buddy. I have decided that in 2009, I will make a resolution to read 12 "classic" children books, suchs as The Jungle Book and The Secret Garden.

I resolve to lose 20 pounds. As of today, I am 3 pounds lighter than I was at the start of 2008. I hope now that school is back in session, I can get into the habit of exercising either before Nikolas gets up or while he is in Kindergarten. Not super progress, but still better than a gain.

Layout of the Day-The Mom 'Do

I got to go scrapbooking for my birthday this weekend. Here is the first layout I finished. It is for my "This Is Me...My Life as a Mom" book.

Last Day of Summer/First Day of School

Since most of the schools in the area started back on Monday, August 25th, we decided to enjoy Nikolas last day of summer with a trip to the zoo. The hippo was on the top of Nik's to-see list.

We got to see a roadrunner in the Fin and Feathers exhibit...the roadrunner is the school mascot of Nik's new school.

After leaving the zoo, we stopped at Cold Stone Creamery for a last day of summer treat.

Tuesday morning was Nik's first day of Kindergarten. Here is outside of our house...

and standing in line with his class (and waiting for his friend Nathan to show up).

Nik hasn't enjoyed school too much so far ("Kindergarten is boring."). His teacher missed the first week due to a death in the family. Hopefully, when she returns tomorrow his attitude will improve.

Flashback Friday-Better Late than Never (birthday edtion)

So, my hard drive bit the dust hours after I posted my first Flashback Friday. I lost EVERYTHING!!! Let this be a warning to all you PC people out there....back up your stuff. I don't even have Garamond loaded yet, so this isn't even in the right font. Grrr!

My 39th birthday is this weekend, so I thought I would post some past birthday pictures. Here I am around my first birthday in 1970.

This is back in 1990, celebrating my 21st birthday in downtown Chicago. These pictures were taken at the hotel we stayed in. Here I am with my good friend Jennifer, who I still see but not often enough. Our sons were born exactly one month apart and have become buddies.

Here I am with my friend, Ann. I haven't seen her in a long time, which is sad.

That night we went out to dinner. I don't remember the name of the place, but it was in the same building as Dick's Last Resort, which was our second stop. Dick's is such a classy place...they gave me a bottle of Mad Dog to celebrate. Our next stop was Excalibur nightclub. They gave us a bottle of champagne and in my drunken state I broke my champagne flute while dancing. I still have the empty bottle and the bottom of the glass as a souvenir of this good time.

Flashback Friday-Check Out Those Guns!

I got the idea to start Flashback Friday from Shannon, one of the scrapbookers at the Coordinates Collections forum.

Every Friday I will post a photo from my pre-blog life and reminisce. Here is the first taken July 3, 1993. I went down to the Taste of Chicago with three of my co-workers (Amy, Chris and Gary) from Yes Check.

This was the first time I had seen Gary (on the left in the photo) in shorts…HUBBA-HUBBA! We started dating about a month after this. The photo was taken at a playground north of the Taste. We were trying to escape the ever-growing crowd gathering for the evening’s fireworks.

The Countdown begins…

If everything goes as planned, today is exactly one year until our trip to Walt Disney World to celebrate my 40th birthday (early). We won’t be able to confirm the dates until we find out when school starts next year.

To help countdown the days, I will be sharing the scrapbook pages I created from our trip in 2006. That trip was to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary.

I used a Mickey shaped serving container as a guide for my brads.

Pictures of us on the plane and Magic Express. The airplane came from Gina’s Treasure Chest on ebay. The cloud lifts up to reveal this journaling:

10/19/08: I was up at 3:30 am, showered and got ready. Gary was up at 4am to shower and dress. We finished packing the last minute toiletry items and woke Nikolas up at 4:30. He had a little breakfast and got dressed. The limo got to our house at 5am. The chauffeur was a very slow driver, but still got us to O’Hare in 30 minutes. We got to our gate and Nikolas was hungry. So Nikolas and I headed to McDonald's. He got some pancakes and I got the fruit and walnut snack. When we got back to the gate, Gary took Nikolas to the bathroom. While they were gone, our flight started to board. As soon as they got back, they called our group. Nikolas was great on his first airplane ride. He watched Scooby Doo DVDs, did workbook pages and played with the vintage Animal Kingdom Happy Meal toys I had gotten for him on Ebay. We split a Sierra Mist and he really enjoyed the in-flight graham crackers.

Once at Orlando airport, we had a potty break and headed for Magic Express, Disney’s transportation service from the airport to the resort hotels. Nikolas enjoyed the bus ride (another first) and the WDW commercial shown on board.

Another paper piecing from Gina’s Treasure Chest and pattern paper from a scrapbook kit I picked up at WDW.

Journaling reads:

I checked us in while Gary and Nikolas watched Lilo and Stitch on the TV in the lobby. The cast member that checked us in gave me a 1st Trip button for Nikolas and two Happy Anniversary buttons for Gary and I. She gave us our room number even though she said it would be about an hour before our room was ready. I told her that was fine. We needed to eat lunch first anyway. We headed for the World Premiere food court. Nikolas had the kid’s spaghetti meal with apple sauce, grapes that came in a Mickey Mouse head plate and orange soda. Gary and I both got the souvenir mugs, which you can use to get free refills at the hotel for your entire trip. I got a taco salad and Gary ate a cheeseburger and fries. Nikolas enjoyed watching the cartoons they played in the food court through out our stay.

This is a pocket page I made that holds the map and other information about All Star Movies. The pattern paper and accents were from a kit I got through Creative Memories. The photos are of the towel basket that “mouse-keeping” left in our window and the pizza box from the night we had pizza delivered to our room.

After we at lunch, I picked up some scrapbook supplies in the gift shop. We headed to our room but it still was not ready, so we walked around the hotel grounds. We would have left to go to Epcot, but we now were carrying the two refillable mugs and my scrapbook supplies along with our carry-on backpack that was extra heavy due to the portable DVD player.

I used the same pattern papers for all the building pictures. I don’t recall the brand, but it shimmers. I cut the die cut movie boards at Archivers and used a white pen for the titles.

Our room was in the Love Bug section

The pictures of the Toy Story section were actually taken the last day of our trip.

Finally something worth posting...

I have been a sort of funk the last couple of weeks so I haven't posted here, scrapbooked or done a daily card.

We took a family trip to the Bristol Renaissance Faire this past Sunday. The weather was wonderful. The only damper on our trip was we had some car trouble. Right when we got to the faire, Gary noticed that the temperature gage was all the way to HOT! On the way home we stopped and picked up some coolant, but the gage kept moving from the middle to hot all the way home--up and down and up and down....It turned out to be a slow leak in our water pump.

Here are the boys on a ride.

Nikolas loves the jousting, so we went to two of the shows.

On Tuesday night, Grandma Mary took Nikolas (and us) to see Walking with Dinosaurs. It was a great show. Nikolas was apprehensive at first. He was worried about dinosaurs "getting" him. We had to keep reminding him that we were too high for the dinos to reach (in the second balcony) and that they weren't real dinos, just puppets.

Here he is looking brave.

Our seats were great--the first row of the balcony. The stage came out quite a bit and we were on the left side, so we had a good overview of just about everything.

Here is Nikolas holding up the inflatable T-Rex Gary bought him. I don't have any pictures of the actually dinosaurs because they do not allow flash photography....and I'm not one of those people who think the rules do not apply to them. I'm actually trying to teach my son to follow the rules by example....it was frustrating to see all the flashes going on around the stadium. If you want to get a glimpse of the show, I think you can find them on YouTube. They are really cool to see in action.