Plugging along...

I've been very busy cleaning things up this week - I am catching up where I've let things slide! I'm really feeling pleased with what I've been able to accomplish.

I found a blog quiz to take today.

You Passed Your Driver's Test

Congratulations, you got 8/10 correct. You're a good driver - at least, when you want to be.

Are You a Good Driver?

 

That was a hard one - it's been a while since I took my driver's test. I don't even know which ones I got wrong.

 

Today is my third day of no soda - hooray for me! I am having a bit of chocolate, which does have caffeine, but I feel like I'm taking steps down from having a Coke each day. I'm also spending some time on the treadmill - that feels good, too!

 

I made a quick craft yesterday using Kathryn Balint's Fairy Godmother kit and a font from Darcy Baldwin's grab bag (available this weekend):

 

 

DD2 is still losing teeth; I think DD1 will lose a few more in a couple of years, if memory serves me correctly. This is just a fun little page printed out & glued to an Altoids tin.

 

I picked up 27 Dresses from Redbox today - it was funny but I don't think that some of the language was necessary. Speaking of bridesmaid dresses, I feel a little bad about what I had my bridesmaids wear. I don't think it was the worst bridesmaid dress ever, but it definitely wasn't a "I can wear this again" dress! My friend Mitzi chose a very pretty dress that I did wear again, and looked nice even though I was 5 months pregnant.

 

What are your plans for International/National Scrapbook Day? I am going to do some scrapping this weekend with my mom. She picked up some keyplate albums to work with - do you know where some good digi templates are sold for these? 

 

Later today I will be adding the product for the secret project to the store - so I'll show you in tomorrow's blog post what I've been translating into digi. You will love it! Even if you don't digiscrap, but you use Photoshop (that would be you, Mitzi!) or any other photo program, you will be able to use these and love them.

 

Have a great Wednesday, everyone!

 

Secret project done!

But I still can't tell about it. I should be able to talk about it by Friday.

Yesterday was my first day without a Coke. Ugh! A lot of it is a mental battle not to find a way to get a Coke. But a good deal of it for the first few days (unfortunately, I've done this before) is headaches and lethargy. That pretty much described me on Monday!

I'd rather not HAVE TO have a Coke, so that's why I'm trying to quit (again).

This is a week of 2 field trips, so I will have interesting pictures to share later this week.

I found a blog meme that gives you a topic for 10 things on Tuesday. This week's is "10 things I love about my life". In no particular order:

1. My family, of course! Immediate family and extended, too.
2. God's unfailing love for me (and you!)
3. Satellite television and DVR.
4. Religious freedom we enjoy in America.
5. Being able to digi-scrap!
6. Chocolate....mmmm yum!
7. Good friends and good times.
8. My dog, Peanut. (Of course, my eldest would argue it's her dog. But I think Peanut thinks that she is mine!)
9. Being able to work at home and be involved with the kids.
10. Shopping on the internet.

Well, everyone, have a great Tuesday!

Magnificent Monday!

I'm so tired! Yesterday was a big anniversary celebration for our church ... 60 years! I was in charge of the celebration. Along with the secretary who I work with - who is so helpful and smart - we organized the day.  With lots of prayer, the day turned out very well! But it's nice to have it be over - even though I enjoyed the time, it was stressful making sure everything was as it should be.

It was great to have my mother-in-law and sister-in-law there. My MIL is moving to Arkansas this week.  

I wasn't quite ready to settle down when I got home, so I organized the bedroom. This space also includes my little computer nook, and I think I finally got it organized how I wanted it (after living here for almost a year!)

I also ordered myself a little something.

 

Crop-a-dile at Costco - pretty good price for it, from what I've seen. Free shipping on it right now, too!

Does anyone have one? What do you love about it? What are different things that you use it for?

I thought I would do a little hybrid crafting here and there - I especially want to do some CD albums. I picked this up a few days ago:

 

Little Flowers

And I'm so proud of myself for walking some on the treadmill yesterday! I really want to make a habit of it.

Do you want to go shopping in my store today? I'd love to give you a coupon for 25% off your purchase of $5 or more: blogreader

Make sure you are logged in to the store and have added the desired items to your cart. Enter the code in the coupon box on the cart page.

The coupon expires May 4, 2008.

I've highlighted this item on my blog:

 

Vintagely Framed

but one item others are also picking up is this:

 

For the Record

So, I wanted to do a blog tag - first I'll answer it, then I'll tag a few others.

5 random things about me:

1. I am not a cat person. I do not find issue with cat people, but I just can't ever see me owning a cat.
2. I own all 7 seasons of the West Wing on DVD.
3. I am a morning person.
4. I wanted to be a teacher when I grew up when I was in the 1st grade. I think it was because I thought the world revolved around my teacher! She was very special.
5. Kettle corn is the best popcorn ever.

So now I tag: Mitzi, Char at Digiscrapchat, Kimberly, Thena if she happens to read my blog, and you, whoever you are reading my blog! Go ahead and list 5 random things about yourself on your blog.

OK, now I'm going to make myself some kettle corn.

Wow!

I finished converting over 50 products for a paper scrapping line into a digi scrapping line. Are my fingers tired! Seriously, they are very beautiful and you'll see me using them a lot - a great embellishment to photos and layouts!

I worked on a layout today (without any of the new product - no sneak peeks!) with Kathryn Balint's redone Fairy Godmother kit.

See credits here.

Saturday's 2peas blog question was:

What do you think about some of the latest trends in scrapping?

I have been seeing an increase on quick pages being designed for specifically-shaped albums, like the bracket album, or keyplate album. I think that is fun, and I'd like to try it someday. But since I don't trust myself to cut a straight line - hence, my penchant for digi scrapping - I don't know if I would trust myself to make an album where I had to carefully cut out the pages. I'm just not that precise!

But really, the albums and quick pages I'm seeing for them are gorgeous. But lately, I've been on the lookout for cute brag books. They make great gifts. I picked up this album by Misty Cato:

 

Spunky Girl - only $3!

And, of course, I want to use the brag book that Angela Sharrow & I worked on together - she made the kit and I did most of the pages.

 

Spring Garden Brag Book

Both of these brag books would make great Mother's Day Gifts.

I'm off to go spend time with my family - I'm trying to be more diligent at getting off the computer and experiencing real life, LOL!

Digi stuff you can get for $1 a piece!

I went shopping yesterday in the Potato Bar.  Let me show you a few of the things I picked up.

 

Rikki's Templates

 

Daisy Grace "Inspire" overlay

 

Krystal Hartley's Inspired by Cheryl

And of course, let me show you my fave of my stuff from the Potato Bar.

Vintagely Framed

I think it's worth it just for the box!

In other PDP news, I am helping bring a traditional scrapbook supplier's products to the shop! You won't see my name on it - that's OK - but just let me tell you, you will want to listen for the news around International Scrapbook Day (May 3rd). I'm helping them translate to digi, and I can't wait to use them! (But I'm making myself wait till I'm done with the project! No scrapping for me!)

And in "other stuff you can get for a dollar" news, I am thinking about picking this up from Scrapartist.

Pretty Pretty Princess - only $1 for today!

OK, now back to that secret project!

Taking the day off...

But wanted to wish my Mom a Happy Birthday.

Happy Birthday, Mom!

!!!

Well, it's Wednesday!

Update from yesterday - yes, she just needs a normal eye appt. - and yes, the earliest they can fit her in is June. Not till after school gets out! That's pretty long to wait. I think, though, since she isn't suffering from headaches or complaining of anything else, that I will wait to have her see this optometrist that my doctor recommended.

Today is Girl Scout Leader Appreciation Day. I've made a candy wrapper in Brownie uniform colors - see a preview here:

You can print it out and wrap it around a candy bar. I sealed the edges, but it made it a little tight. It fits a standard sized Hershey chocolate bar.

Click here to download it from box.net.

Of course, you don't have to use it just for Girl Scouts...you can use it for whatever you want! For example, today is Administrative Professionals Day. That is one of the hats I wear, so I'll be getting taken out to lunch later today!

I made the paper - I think it will be in an upcoming kit. I love that shade of blue!

The 2peas blog prompt for today:

What did you do before we had the Internet?

I read more before. I think I watched more TV. Most hobbies I had turned into digiscrapping and looking up things online.

Well, that wraps up today! See you on Thursday!

The Potato Bar is open!

Check out my store for my Potato Bar items or go here for all the designer's Potato Bar items. Just 99 cents each!

And I'm so honored to be spotlighted at Digiscrapchat today - thanks, Char! Go over to her blog to read the interview, and you might just find a contest & some coupons to help you shop!

Update from yesterday's post:

Winner of my part of the Potato Bar: MichelleWaite1! Michelle, please e-mail me at Juliana@JulianaGordon.com to receive your coupon code.

Yes, we did find the remote. It was in another room of the house.

DD1's appointment went OK. The doctor thinks our daughter has eye strain and she referred us to another doctor...who can't see her till June. I think I will call the first doctor back today to ask if she needs a medical appt. (which is what we have) or just a test for glasses appt. She may need glasses. Since DH had glasses early in life, this is not entirely surprising.

I tried this test yesterday after seeing it on someone's blog:

 

Your Spelling is Perfect

You got 10/10 correct. Your spelling is excellent. You also have a great memory and eye for detail.

How's Your Spelling?

I wasn't sure...but it was nice to know! Some were very easy but others made me think.

I'm pretty busy this week - we have a HUGE event planned for this Sunday at church, and I'm in charge. It's crunch time! A lot of details have to come together in the next few days. I'm praying that it all works out!

Right after that, my MIL is moving away to Arkansas. We are all going to miss her so much!

Have a fabulous Tuesday, everyone!

Giving away my Potato Bar!

One lucky random poster today (by 9:00 PM Eastern) will win my Potato Bar! That's 11 very cool items. Take a look.

 

The Potato Bar starts tomorrow, but enter today only, by 9pm Eastern, by leaving a comment on my post. I will draw one person at random to receive a coupon code to win my portion of the Potato Bar, which includes all the items listed above in this post. Please leave an e-mail address or at least a link to your blog (if you have one) so I have some way of contacting you!

In other news...

DD1 has squinted one eye for a long time. I can't tell if it's habit or if something is wrong with her eye. She doesn't have headaches or complain about it, so we are going to take her to the doctor today to see if it's something that needs to be further addressed.

There are a bunch of Bloggy Giveaways going on this week all around the web! Here's the list: http://www.donttryit.com/bloggy_giveaways/ , and here are a couple that I've entered.

Digiscrapchat

Real Life

And, it's very hard to watch TV if you lose the remote and you have the DISH. Trust me!

Well, it's lunch-making time, so I better run! Have a great Monday!

So...

It was a great Saturday! The playdate went well, we went to the surprise party and managed to get there before the surprise - a fear of mine is spoiling the surprise! - and the charity dinner was beautiful!

It was for a institute that uses NILD methods to help with different learning abilities. I was very impressed with their presentation.

I wore my fancy dress...

and Dave wore his suit.

It was so fun to have a night out. We try to have a date every week, but we rarely get to do something this fancy!

In scrappy news, I scrapped a chart yesterday using my new chart template coming on Tuesday to Polkadotpotato, and Velma Balint's Bloomin Crazy kit.

This is the chart template - I gave the one above an extra column to fit with my Weight Watchers plan.

I better get going - church isn't going to wait for me!

Great day planned!

A playdate, a surprise party (where we will probably miss the surprise), and a charity dinner! (This is the fancy dress night. )

I finally got everything packaged up for the Potato Bar - now just to get everything uploaded!

Oh, I took a picture earlier this week of how high the gas prices are getting - sadly, I know later on I will look at them and wish they were that low.

 

$3.99 for premium...sigh.

And then, we drove by later that day and saw this.

It was a windy day, and the "3" blew off of the price. I could tell from the short lines at the station that it was not the actual price! But it did make me giggle a little bit.

Hope you all have a wonderful Saturday!

Finally Friday

We spent yesterday visiting my mother-in-law. She will be moving from California to Arkansas at the end of the month. It's really sad to see her go, knowing that we won't see her as often. I'm hoping she'll start reading the blog so she can see our pictures a little easier!

Our friend runs a tax preparation business, and at the end of the tax season, she throws a huge dinner for her employees & family. I guess we are "like family", so we're invited too! We had yummy Italian food. And plates of parmesan cheese.

Sorry it's so blurry - my point and shoot camera!

That's DD2 and a plate of...parmesan cheese. Yuck!

Today I plan to finally package up my new items for the Potato Bar. I also plan to NOT go shopping - I am trying to show some financial restraint.  

The 2peas blog challenge for today:

What is the essential core of friendship for you?

I think that loyalty is big for me. I love knowing that my friends will be there for me, through thick and thin. I have some great friends that fit this description very well, and I am so grateful for them. I hope to be that kind of friend to my friends, also.

Have a super Friday!

Guess what?

I will be featured on Char's blog, Digiscrapchat, next week! I just finished up my answers she sent me for the interview, but now I have to add some previews to them.

After thinking that hard to answer the questions, I think this will be a short post for today.

Another blast from the past:

DD#1 - not quite a year old!

DD#1 a couple of weeks ago. Where did the time go?!

By the way, be sure not to miss the post from yesterday - it is so sad, without any comments! You miss one day on the 2peas thread/DST Blog Train, and your blog gets lonely!

P.S. You might notice a "Revolution Money Exchange" in my sidebar. I signed up with them yesterday after another scrapper recommended them to me. It is kind of like Paypal. I don't know of a ton of sellers accepting it - I think that some Etsy sellers might take it. They do give you a $25 bonus for signing up. Then, if you get friends to sign up, you get $10 per person up to $500! If you want to sign up, it would be nice for me if you clicked on the button to the right so I could get a referral bonus.

Have an awesome Thursday!

What happens when you blog something instead of calling your mother...

You get a phone call from her asking why you didn't tell her that her granddaughter was sick! Sorry, Mom!

I finally did get to see Dan in Real Life - I've been stalking Redbox for it to be available, and it finally was. I thought it was very funny and well worth the $1 I spent to rent it.

So I did finally get a layout finished!

So proud of our math champion!
I used Kathryn Balint's A Little Birdie Told Me from KB and Friends. I also used Darcy Baldwin's 8 x 8 bracket album templates, soon to be released at Thedigichick, and some styles by Rose.li. The font is Kimberly Geswein's Love Ya Like a Sister.

The first 2 pictures were majorly Photoshopped - I took them from far away with my zoom - and they turned out OK considering how they started out.

We got something exciting yesterday - we asked a friend, who is a computer guy, if he knew of a computer for our girls - their computer was starting to smell like melted plastic. He was able to fix us up with one that is perfect for them. Thank you, friend! DD1 is playing on it right now when she should be getting ready for school. Must do something about that!

Today's blog prompt from 2Peas:

What would you do if you knew you wouldn't fail?

I would probably be a little more outgoing with people. I am a little shy (although not as shy as I used to be), and I would take more risks, socially, than retreating to my own little safe corner of the world.

My plans for today? I am hoping to get some more scrapping done today and maybe finish up my packaging for the Potato Bar. I also have a meeting for the decorating committee for the upcoming school play, supervising swimming at school, and stocking up on groceries. I always make too many plans in my head and then wonder why I didn't get it all done!

Talk to you on Thursday!

Good grades, Fifth's Disease, and Scrappy Shopping

The girls did so good on their report cards. They both continue to improve. We did a little shopping after school today to celebrate. All three of us like to check out thrift stores (especially since you can buy so much for so little!) We found some great books today. I even went through some vintage books (I refer to this chart to determine whether or not something is copyright free) but didn't find anything that I couldn't resist.

DD#2 has ended up with Fifth's Disease. From what I understand, it's not really all that harmful to her, but it can be bad for a pregnant woman if she catches it. Unfortunately, we hung out with my 6 month pregnant friend last week. I sure hope she is OK!  She is going to talk to her OB about it. If you pray, say a prayer that everything will be OK for my friend. DD was probably not contagious then - she was probably contagious 2 weeks before any symptoms showed up.

I am feeling a little nostalgic today, so I am sharing one of my favorite pictures of all time.

My sis, me, and my bro. Aren't we cute! Obviously, I'm the youngest of the group, then my sister is a few years older. My brother is 6 years older - the same age as my husband. They went to school together. I believe this picture was taken on family vacation, after our VW bus had broken down?

Onto other things...

Tuesday's Blog Prompt from 2Peas:

With the economy how it is today, have you started to cut back on your scrap shopping? If so, how?

I don't do a ton of scrap shopping - usually I either use kits I acquire as a member of a creative team, or kits that I already have. I don't scrap as much as I used to before I designed, either. That's something I do hope to change in the future.  I don't want to miss out on recording the stories of my family, especially at my girls' precious ages.

I've done less printing of my layouts, though - that's probably a result of trying to cut back. They will be printed someday!

So, I'm thinking, what would I buy if I had $10 to spend just for fun - no commercial use tools allowed?

I'd pick this up from Aja Abney at Scrapartist for $3.50...

A kit from Faith True...(I used to be on her CT...she is so sweet!)

So then I would have the awkward 50 cents left...hmm...let's round that up to a $1.00 and see what that can get.

How 'bout this cute date marking thing by Amy Teets?

That imaginary shopping trip was fun!

One last thing - guess what's happening at Polka Dot Potato, on April 15th only?

That's right...30% off just about everything! Woohoo!

Click Polkadotpotato to shop.

Hope that Tuesday treats you well. Catch you on Wednesday!

Memorable Monday

I totally love this picture of me (with the yellow ribbons) and my sister, from the late 70's.  It reminds me of hanging out on the patio after my mom squirted it off with the hose (before the drought, of course!), and reading, and playing different games with my sister. Like the one where we played "monster". My monster weapon of choice was a bath towel. Hers was a plastic golf club. The end result being, you can't even see the scar on my forehead anymore!

I think I have finished up everything I want to sell at the Potato Bar at PolkaDotPotato. The Potato Bar starts Tuesday, April 22nd. Now I just have to do previews and terms of use documents. I have 11 products, which include 10 template sets and 1 mini-kit.

If you are a fan of Polkadotpotato, and on Facebook, you might want to check out the fan page here: Facebook | Polkadotpotato.com . The incredible Ashley Smith, owner of PDP, set it up. I'm also on Facebook - search for the Juliana Gordon who does not belong to a network. That's me.

I was able to finally set up this blog on a custom domain. From now on, you will be able to access it at: http://www.thejulianablog.com/ or you can still get to it at: http://www.julianasgordon.blogspot.com/. My advice, if you want to buy a custom domain to go with your blogspot/blogger blog, you should buy it through blogger. It is just a lot easier to get it all set up.

I shared a few blogs with you that I read last week - here's a few more.

Ikea Goddess - Wonderful recap of the digital scrapbook freebies.

Stamping and Stuff - sister of Kimberly Geswein and all-around nice person.

Misty Cato Designs - A great mix of tutorials, digiscrapping news, and Misty's great designs.

Sweetmade - I especially love the freebies that they offer - some are commercial use friendly!

Dawn Marchant - Great photographer AND writer. Most of her entries have me cracking up!

Today's 2 Pea Challenge is:

In the craft world.
Who do you envy and why?

I'll change it to, who do I admire, and why. I will talk about a great layout artist and a designer whose popularity is on the rise, Laurie Ann of Heaven's Gate Designs. I met her on the KB and Friends site creative team last year. She is a very sweet person and incredibly creative. Here are some of my fave layouts of hers:

Well, let's start with her logo - it's gorgeous!

Credits for this here.

Credits here.

Fresh Picked - Gallery

And don't forget to check out her shop.

Have an awesome Monday, everyone!

Kim Possible and other assorted items

We went to quite the party on Saturday. A special appearance was made by none other than:

Kim Possible!

She defeated the bad guy. I won't show you pictures - it made the very little ones cry! I actually think that the adults that saw him sneaking up might have been more startled than the savvy children.

Just a couple more pictures from the party:

Youngest DD watching Kim Possible triumph over the evil Dr. Doom.

Oldest DD picked only books for the treasure hunt, bypassing stuffed animals, figurines, and all sorts of other prizes. She ended up with 5 books. While we were getting ready to go home, she told me she had read one in the backyard during the party. I was inside during the second half of the party, so I didn't see her do that - I would have told her to play instead! But I do appreciate her love of reading, especially since I have the same affinity for literature myself!

I am hoping that this post will turn out the way I think it will look - I am experimenting with Windows Live Writer to compose my blog entry. I think I might be able to tell it when to post (something Blogger doesn't do) and I am able to add the frames to the pictures, automatically spell-check, and use a smiley now and then.

No new layouts to share - I finished up 3 out of the 5 designing projects I wanted to complete today.  That felt good.

Have a great Sunday!

A new product for photographers, and a cool dress for a fancy dinner!

First, I want to show you a quick card I made for photographers. It's my goal to make to bring affordable, quality cards that home-based & studio-based photographers (no franchises, please!) can use for their clients.



This one is only $3.00! Click here to go to my card page in my blogstore.

My husband and I have been invited to be guests at a benefit dinner next week. I thought I might wear my "reunion" dress - I wore it to my high school reunion a while ago - and to my surprise and pleasure, it fit! A little tight around the high collar (that makes it sound funny - it came up like a mock turtleneck - and it looks so much better than I am describing it!), but doable. The cute sweater that I wore with it, though, looked a little outdated. So I thought I would check to see if I could get a cute little thing to go with the dress.

Instead, I got such a beautiful, black dress! It was only $14.00! It was a size larger than I would be wearing now (hooray!) but it fits just fine. And it looks so pretty. My youngest DD says so, so it must be true!

I'll show pictures after I've gone to the dinner (and I get someone to take a picture of us - we are going to look sharp!)

Oldest DD & I figured out how to spend her "cookie dough" from last year - that's the Girl Scout money that they earn from selling cookies. It expires in June for us. (PSA for Girl Scouts - spend your cookie dough!) She will be a junior next year, so we picked up what she needed for that, and some "just for fun" Girl Scout items. Like these!


Of course! She loves dogs. It cost as much as her Junior books. But it was her money!


I think this is the necklace we ordered.

In the evening, our school showed a movie outside, and served popcorn & bottled water. I was so cold! It must have been 60 degrees. :) I know that sounds so not cold to people - but remember, it will be twice that (120 degrees!) this summer, so my heat tolerance has to be high! Conversely, I get cold very quickly!

2Peas blog prompt for today: My scrapping plans for today

-I would like to scrap a page "just because"
-I would like to make some sort of page/card for the Girl Scout leaders - it's leader appreciation day pretty soon. I'd love to do something special for them.
-I want to get 3 or 4 more template items done for the Potato Bar. I showed some of my fellow PDP designers the ones I've finished, and they liked them.

Have an awesome weekend, everyone!

Desire, a layout, and Martian Child

The 2 Peas blog prompt today is: what are your desires?

This is what I desire my desire to be:

Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. Ps. 73:25, NIV

Slowly but surely, working on that!

Here's a layout I made using Velma Balint's new kit from KB and Friends:


My current Redbox movie for today is Martian Child. I am watching it now - it is really wonderful so far. John Cusack's character's name is my husband's name, which is a little odd!

Have a great Friday!

Some Etsy goodness...

Inspired to go Etsy shopping by another blogger, I picked this up from SewMuchDetail.



Isn't it so cute? I had my keys one huge lanyard that I sometimes wore around my neck. I was starting to feel the "frumpiness" of this certain look, so I picked this up. Still large enough to find in my purse, but cute and pretty!

I am watching No Reservations right now. I'm trying to get into it, but it's not a good "watch it while I'm working on the computer" movie! I picked it up from Redbox - I really like being able to reserve the movies online. The girls are going to watch Snowbuddies (again!) and a Stuart Little DVD.

The Potato Bar at Polka Dot Potato is now set for April 22 - May 6th. I'm glad that I now have several more days to work on it. I have LOTS of ideas and I really would like to get them ready for everyone to buy at such fabulous prices!

So, I'm off to work on them. Have a fantastic day!

the best laid plans...

The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. Well, that's certainly true! But I will attempt to make some plans today anyway. The 2peas blog prompt for today is "What are your scrapping plans for today"? Well, I have designing plans - getting ready for the Potato Bar next week at Polka Dot Potato - but I really should make scrapping plans! I have this collection by Velma Balint of KB and Friends to play around with.





Available here.

There are a few more accessories & papers that you can pick up that go along with this kit. I was waiting for inspiration to hit, but I think instead I will go shake my inspiration awake and make some layouts tonight!

I did move my blog to a custom domain, but it hasn't fully made the move yet. It still switches over to the blogspot address, but at least people can access it today!

Oh, and I just got this sale notice in my e-mail.

I used to sell with Jen over at KB and Friends -- I love her stuff! She is having a sale through April 14th. I definitely will check that out!

My non-scrapping, non-designing plans? Cleaning. Sigh. Not my favorite!

Well, oops.

This blog was down yesterday as I tried to move it to a custom domain name, never mind, it's on www.thejulianablog.com now. There's a small chance that when you click on that link, it will forward back to this blog. But as of now, no luck!

I was able to set up my other site, www.julianagordon.com, almost instantly, so this is a little frustrating!

Not much to report here. I'll post more tomorrow.

Blogging about blogs

Yesterday, I blogged, went to church, learned how extract in Photoshop using paths. :) <------- So proud of myself on that one! We also went to the mall for a little while and spent gift certificates we had been hanging onto.

So, I thought I might share some of the blogs in my blog reader.
KB and Friends - Kathryn Balint's site blog
Jessica Sprague - Photoshop expert and all around great scrapper
The Gesweins - their life in China
Cathy Zielske - scrapper, graphic design artist, funny lady! I met her once at a 2Peas mixer in Southern California. She totally cracks me up!
Digiscrapchat - News & interesting items from around digiscrapping land! I've e-mailed back and forth with Char a couple of times - she seems very sweet. (Hi, Char!)

Now, my question to you...
What blogging platform do you use to blog, and why? I keep thinking of certain things I want to do with my blog, but Blogger doesn't do them. On the other hand, it's free! I don't have to worry about bandwidth. The main thing I seem to be missing is a gallery - I think I'd like to have a gallery.

Let me know your answer in the comments section.

See you tomorrow!

Rounding up March, and an ADSR layout

This is the first time I have done a roundup! Katie the Scrapbook Lady posts a challenge on her blog to summarize each month with a "Roundup". It will help you in scrapbooking, for sure, but it's also nice to take a look back at the previous month to get a perspective on what happened. I modified a question or two a bit; for the full list of the questions, click on the "Roundup" link above.

What books and/or magazines did I read this month?

I have been reading a lot less than I used to. I tried to start a couple of novels, including "It Happens Every Spring" by Gary Chapman & Catherine Palmer, but I haven't finished it yet. Note to self: reserve more books at the library to read!

What movies and/or tv shows did I watch this month?

I guess this is where it gets embarrassing, where I admit that I watch TV more than reading.

We have a DVR - have since January - and we DVR Frasier & Monk, and the occasional movie. I also keep caught up on my reruns of Gilmore Girls. I bought one season of Gilmore Girls - the last season. I hadn't seen all of them and watched them in about 3 days time. I liked doing that a lot!

Youngest DD & I saw Horton Hears a Who for a field trip on the day it came out. Then we saw it with the rest of the family during Easter vacation.

What special days did I celebrate and how?

We celebrated Easter with Easter baskets (a Webkinz each!) and a service at church. Dave was sick with the flu over Holy Week, so only ended up preaching (and singing - both so bad for his voice!) on Good Friday. He had speakers for the Sunrise Service & Easter Sunday. We also had an Easter Egg Hunt at church after the service, which I was in charge of.

What gifts did I give and/or receive?

See Easter Baskets mentioned above, and also, the girls & I got Bibles in a bag from Christianbook.com. So easy for me to throw in my purse! And the girls enjoy having a special Bible for Awana.

What fun things did I do with my friends and/or family?

We went to the park with friends. We celebrated Easter with Grandma Gordon - she is moving soon. We went to my parents for a few days over Easter vacation - the girls had said they wanted a beach vacation. Funny to hear them say it like that! It is too cold to get in the water, still. We went for a couple of hours one morning and took pictures there.

What special or unusual purchases did I make?

I bought a used cell phone off of eBay. I wanted a phone with a speakerphone feature. It is so much smaller than the phone we refer to as "the brick".

I bought a membership to Purple Paper Flowers Designer Club - then won a random rebate of $20!

I renewed my membership to actionfx.

What were this month's disappointments?

Not having consistent, quality quiet times - I want to make it the most important part of my day. But my devotions have felt hit and run lately. I am sad about that. My fault, not God's. :)

What were my accomplishments this month?

I changed the look of my blogstore and started a new blog to match. I think they look pretty good.

I maintained my weight loss mostly. I need to do a jumpstart or something to keep it lost, and to lose a little bit more. I am eating way too sloppy!

Anything else noteworthy to record?

I did a fair amount of substitute teaching for 1st grade. It made me appreciate teachers more.

***

Now, this layout was the last layout for the ADSR challenge. I chose the picture and did the journaling, and my race partner (my mom) did the scrapping.



Katie Pertiet: papers (recolored) Ledger Sunprints and Simply Ledger Restful, also Katie’s You Are Here brush and Ledger Journalers brush. Font is Harting Plain. Panos’ book action on the screenshot photo.


I like how she made it into a book! My mom is a very creative and talented scrapper. Really, Mom!

***

And I have decided to do the 2Peas blog challenge when I can - here's the one for today.
How is life different for your children than when you were growing up?

Um, so different! One of the first things I noticed in the technological arena is that kids expect to see the preview of the picture you just shot. That only would have happened if you had a Polaroid camera when I was growing up. (We did, but didn't use it a bunch). Also, I don't know that I actually used a computer till I was in high school. Our kids started using the computer by 2 or 3 (in supervised, controlled ways!) And our oldest DD had full knowledge of how to use the DVR - sometimes better than DH!

I also was taking pictures of us baking, and oldest DD said "Mom, you're taking pictures for your blog, aren't you?" which I wasn't...it was for a scrapbook layout. (blush)

In other areas, I think the expectation has grown on the "I can do anything Mom". The myth of her has grown over the years. It makes for a lot more frustrating, stressed out Moms. And that's not good for the kiddos!

***
It looks like I have at least 2 or 3 scrapbook pages I can make out of this post. I love having it organized here for me!

Have an awesome Sunday!

She beat the integers off of her opponents...

Sorry, a little geeky math humor there. Guess what oldest DD did?



She won first place at the Math Olympics in her grade & category! Great going! She also got a medal because she scored higher than 80% on the test. (I don't know what she scored - they didn't tell us.) They make the tests so hard that not every 1st place winner scored 80%. We are so proud of her!

In other news...

We finally made it over to Home Depot to one of their Kids' Workshops...hear that, Mitzi? :)





It's a free workshop they have the first Saturday of each month. We made a planter box today. They had fun and it was free!

Then, it was onto the Grand Prix to race their cars.











They didn't win any races or design contests, but everyone got a ribbon. So nice.

And I have one more thing to share. I hired KJ Conners to make a blinkie for my photography tools site...wanna see?



Didn't she do an awesome job? I love it!

OK, I am going to make myself work on the ideas that I have in my head before they run away! How did it get to be so late in the day already?!

Ribs, Mathletics, and a free text path template!

I got a great deal on spareribs at the supermarket and made this recipe - yum! I made an entire slab, so we will be eating ribs for a while. :)

Today we are going to a math competition for my oldest daughter. I was telling my friend Kimberly about it, that she is a "mathlete". She commented that she is so young to get started in "mathletics". We had a good chuckle about that!

So now, for the freebie I promised you all!