More layouts...

First of all, thanks for all the healthy wishes! I'm happy to report that Noah continues amazingly to be healthy, Nathan has made it out of bed and back to work, and Asher may be on the mend. Maybe. Micah's hanging in there...not as bad as Asher but still not 100%. I've joined them and have a lovely little head cold going on now...but I'm still better than Asher, so that's something.

Meanwhile, here are three Lists of Me layouts I haven't shared yet. I'm behind by a week now thanks to this croup crud but will work on catching up...later. :)

I've, incidentally, thought of many more things I'd add to the above list since finishing this layout... ;)

Love the big frame things that I cut in half and used on the above layout. You can find them here. I was so proud of myself for using one right away and can't wait to use some of the other goodies I got from her shop!

Big thanks to my pal Jennifer Latham for the inspiration behind this last one! :)

Okay. Off to take some drugs now...happy Thursday everyone!

Croup sucks.

Yeah. Sorry I've been missing again. Asher appears to have brought home the croup virus over the weekend. Our best guess is that he got it at Options last Monday, as only 3 of the 12 kids in his class showed up yesterday I'm told. Poor kid is miserable. (Seriously, folks, the kid has been awake for only like 9 hours out of every 24 since Friday night. He barely spoke Saturday and Sunday. No congestion...just a very sore throat, fatigue and general all over achiness. Not usual for him at all.)

We went to the doctor (well, urgent care) on Sunday to test for strep...it was negative and they prescribed antibiotics, claiming it was likely some other bacterial infection. Got the antibiotics. Today he took his third dose...still no significant improvement. But. This morning, Micah woke up with a very stridor like cough...something we recognize (he's had croup before as an infant). Called the pediatrician. Had both boys looked at. She declared they both have croup and that would explain Asher's laryngitis-like symptoms (swollen throat) and why the antibiotics weren't helping (croup is viral). Glad to finally have a reasonable explanation, but irked that there's really nothing that can be done/taken to make Asher feel better faster. Joy. (On the plus side, Micah, though his glands and lungs and everything else sound and look worse than Asher's, doesn't appear to believe that he's sick. The kid is running around and acting totally fine...guessing, though, that nighttime will be another matter if history is anything to go by.)

Oh, and on top of that, Nathan's sick too...something different likely. I'm attributing at least part of it to getting too run-down stressing and working himself too much in the past month to get to the deadline they met Sunday night. So. He's been home for the last couple days (which, right there tells you how sick he is as he very rarely gets sick enough to be out of commission more than one day). He's pretty much been sleeping and trying to get some food/liquids down. He may well be home tomorrow, too. He's definitely still sick.

So. Noah and I are busy washing our hands and keeping our fingers crossed. :) We're pretty much laying low this week and staying home (other than runs to the store for meds and comfort foods). Bleh.

But. Even though I've been averaging about 4 hours of sleep a night (constant interruptions from boys needing meds or drinks or to refill the humidifiers), I know that I am blessed that this is an unusual occurrence for us. My heart goes out to those of you with kiddos who are sick more often than once a year or so and to single parents everywhere who do this alone every time.

And. I had a fabulous time on Saturday just cropping with some friends at my favorite local scrapbook store, The Treasure Box. I managed to get 14 layouts done, which is (sadly) perhaps more than I've finished all year. Many were layouts that had just been in my to do pile for ages, so even though they're nothing fancy, I'm thrilled to have them DONE. :) Wanna see some of them?

Loved using the Fiskars Upper Crest border punch on this one (above)!

(Yes, this is one I've done before for the Prism CHA booth...but I don't get to keep those so generally make duplicates. This one turned out slightly different, though.)

Okay, I have more to say and share but need to go distribute nighttime medicines now...:)

Overheard...

Earlier tonight...Micah (age 3.5) says to Nathan, "Who do you like better, David Cook or Carrie UnderWEAR?"!! I promise; that's what he said. Oh my goodness. That kid...cracks. me. up.

(Background: On Wednesday's American Idol results show, they had a clip of David Cook (all three boys' favorite singer ever...probably because he's one of the only singers they've ever seen on television, lol) singing alongside Carrie Underwood. Apparently, that five seconds made a huge impression because Noah, having never heard of Carrie Underwood until then, has been talking about how she's "about as good" as David Cook. I guess Micah was paying attention, LOL!)

Haiku anyone?

We were talking about medieval Japan, Korea and China again today during history, and wrapped it up by writing some haikus. Thought I'd share. :) Here they are (yes, I helped some, but the ideas and words were truly each boy's...I just helped with formatting):

SUMMER by Micah

The grass is so green
The sprinkler makes a rainbow
I love summertime.

WINTER by Asher

Snow means I can sled
falling snow is beautiful
it's soft for snowballs.

SPRING by Noah

Warmth with a small breeze
carries the smell of the trees
I like spring flowers.

I'm biased, obviously, but I think these turned out pretty dang well for first haiku attempts. :) I had each boy write his out and illustrate it also. Cool.

Oh. And in regard to the question of where I found that acrylic and metal album I use for my Weekly 2009 album...I'm almost positive I found mine on clearance at Office Depot and haven't seen them since. But, I found some for sale online at Office Max. Check here. Hope that helps!

Guess I was gone there for a bit...

Sorry about that. No real excuses or anything...just busy with life. :) So. Quick recap and then some other stuff, okay?

Shortly after the Groundhog saw his shadow and I explained about 6 more weeks of winter to the boys, we had a stretch of unseasonably warm weather that led to backyard picnics, bubble play and more time at the park. Since then, we've also had a couple bouts of snow but appear to be back to weirdly warm.

Schoolwork has continued as usual and we're really enjoying it. Last week, for example, we were studying about medieval China and the introduction of wooden printing blocks...which turned into a fabulous time carving our own rubber stamps (rubber = much easier for kids to carve than wood). Will try to stamp some samples this weekend, as the boys came up with some really nice ones and are itching to do more!

Of course, not all schoolwork is easy. Having a difficult time this week with math actually. How does one explain to an 8 year old who can do the math in his head that sometimes it's necessary to show his work? Long division this week and still working on getting him to write out 735 divided by 4 rather than just telling me that it's 183.5...incidentally, also working on at least showing him about remainders, though generally he's converting to decimals and fractions in his head automatically, too. Yes, I know it's wonderful he can do it in his head...I just want him to also know *how* to write it out. After he shows me he gets that part, he can go back to doing it in his head. :)

Been loving my special times with each boy. I spend one-on-one time with Micah every Monday while the other two are in Options (doing stuff like errands but also reading together at the "love berry" (aka library)) but we've also been trying to get back to the special nights we started a couple years ago where Nathan or I take one boy out for some special one-on-one time. In January, Nathan took one boy each weekend. In February, I've done that. Noah and I spent an afternoon chatting and visiting the Discovery Science Museum. Asher and I went bowling. Fun times!

All about Valentines around here for the past week or so. Together, the boys and I made more than 120 Valentines for them to give out to cousins and at our homeschool group party last Thursday. Nothing fancy...Ash made a little topper to go on these popper things he put into baggies:

Noah made a card to go with the little gliders that he handed out:

And Micah drew a colorful picture to go with the Valentine fortune cookies he handed out (when not snitching them):

At the party, the boys distributed their Valentines to the other kids' boxes/bags, having decorated their own bags to collect theirs in earlier that day. There was also bingo with conversation hearts as the markers, LIMBO (hilarious to watch!), freeze dance (Micah freakin' cracks me up) and the annual decorating of the cookies and cupcakes. :) Yup, lots of good times.

On the 14th, the boys, Nathan and I celebrated on our own at Whole Foods...where they were having a chocolate fountain and dipping all sorts of cookies, cupcakes, fruits and brownies. Had lunch and dessert there. Yum! I then spent the rest of the day with my awesome girlfriends...Molly & Melissa...it was fabulous just chatting and eating and chatting some more. :)

Monday, the 16th, Asher's class at Options had their own little Valentine's party so more Valentines were made over the weekend...didn't remember to take any pics but they were adorable...little sand buckets with shovels, a note from Asher saying "I dig you...happy (heart) day!", and a couple pieces of candy. I must here apologize that I did not make any Valentines of my own to send out this year. But I think that's okay, don't you?

What else? We've also taken the boys swimming a few times at our gym, pre-registered for next year's Options program, and continued to watch American Idol as a family (strangely good time). Nathan's been busy with work. I've finished up an ad (for the boys' music class/school) and three layouts (for CK). Yup, stuff like that. :) This weekend I'm doing a little book signing at my local (awesome) scrapbook store and will be there all day with some friends cropping. If you're in the area, stop by!!

Whew. Now. Three other quick things:

1. Don't forget about the February Month by Month challenge! Details can be found through the links over on the left here. Also, if you want to plan ahead, March's challenge is already up as well. :)

2. Creating Keepsakes has a new BLOG! Check it out, okay? And promise me you won't go listen to some of the videos that were shot at CHA. We won't mention which ones but let's just say that I hate how your own voice always sounds so different when recorded, kwim? ;) In any case, fun stuff.

3. To answer some of the questions that folks had about my Weekly 2009 album (soooo sorry I haven't gotten back to this till now)...each 8.5x11 page represents one week. Yes, each page has nine slots and each week has seven days. This means there are extra slots. Sometimes I've been using them for pictures, sometimes I simply leave them blank. :) Roughly speaking, the idea is to use the little slots to document daily happenings...it's actually turned into a 365 sort of project since I've been recording a bit for each day, even if it's nothing more than writing "went to the library" or something. Many of my days have turned out to be just a list of stuff we did but some (and this is really the reason behind the whole thing) are days I'll want to remember because of something a boy said or did so I try to add those notes, too. Things like the day that Asher finally ate meat are things I'm going to want to be able to go back and find, kwim?

And, since I'm at it, here are quick (not great) shots of my weeks since the last time I posted pictures from my Weekly 2009 album:

Beyond being able to go back and see what was going on, I'm still just so in love with the fact that I used up so many scraps of paper to put this together and continue to use up lots of little stuff that might otherwise get neglected in my stash. Yay!

Okay, I think that's probably about the limit of what one can be expected to read (past it really, huh? LOL!). Thanks for hanging with me till the end here and I'll do better about not letting so long pass next time. In fact, I'm hoping to get heaps of layouts done this weekend and will try to share some of those shortly thereafter!