I am back!!!!

Wow! It is hard to believe that it has been over 10 months since my last post.  A lot has been going on here at the Smith/Collins household.  Robbie & Dani got married on August 10.  Jimmy has finally got a running vehicle. Tony & Dillon have completed another year of high school.  I now have a Senior & Sophomore.  We survived football, wrestling & track season.  I got a new job working as a Cashier at Walmart, & survived working during the Christmas season.

Wrestling season of course is my favorite & Tony ended his season with a record of 19-16, he placed in all but 1 tournament he participated in.  Getting 3rd in the PAC Tournament, 5th at the Coshocton Classic, 6th at the Tuslaw Invitational even with having to forfeit 2 matches due to a concussion, and 5th in the Claymont D2 sectional tournament making him a district alternate.  Dillon finished 4-9 on the JV squad not bad for a kid who only wrestles so he can know how to counter his brothers moves.

Dillon decided to throw shot & discus during Track instead of playing baseball.  By the end of the season each throw was better than the last with his Personal record in discus being 74'9" & his Personal Record in Shot being 27'11".  Jimmy moved from crew member at Wendy's to shift supervisor.  He also was accepted into the Nursing program at Kent State Tusc this fall.  Robbie & Dani are both working at the local John Deere shop.  Dani is the parts girl & Robbie the mechanic. I am proud of all my boys & my daughter in love.

Now that I have caught you up on our lives, I invite you to join me on a little adventure in organization/cleaning.

II have Fibromyalgia, a condition that main symptoms are constant pain, depression & low energy.  I have been learning to deal with this life long condition since I was diagnosed in 2000.  I had been doing fairly well managing the condition up until 2009 when my stress level increased due to marital & financial problems.  This lead to me being depressed and with next to no energy to make it through a day.  It was at that time when the condition of my house started to decline.  It got bad as I was just surviving & pain was constantly preventing me from getting housework done.  It finally got to the point where it was so bad I didn't even know where to start on getting it back to looking like a livable home again.  Divorce, financial issues, severely stressful job situations and being unemployed didn't help my stress/pain levels at all.

Then in November I was hired on at Walmart and believe it or not since then my stress level has significantly lowered.  I still deal with constant pain, some days are better than others and still have days where getting out of bed is a big challenge.  The difference now is I am finally not feeling depressed and hopeless and I am trying to do something about getting my home back in order.  I know my house didn't get to be a disaster overnight, so it won't get cleaned & Organized overnight.  So I will be taking it slow, working on a room or 2 at a time until they are complete.  Doing more than on room allows me to focus on getting done chores that fit my pain & energy level for the day.

The organization and cleaning that needs done, does at times overwhelm me, but I when I am unable to physically able to clean I am now searching Pinterest for inspiration and ideas that work on an extremely small budget.   I have decided to start blogging my progress to help keep me motivated, share ideas & pins with others & to show my progress so on bad days I can see how far I have progressed.

Those of you who have checked out my blog for crafty inspiration don't worry I will still post my artwork & pictures of my scrapbook room also.

Thanks for reading Jenn.

September and our Vacation (long Post with lots of pictures)

Boy did September Fly By.  If you have ever been around our household you will know that September is a very chaotic month for us.  It starts out with the start of school, football games, and the winding down of summer, then it runs into what the boys & I call the best seven days of September, the Tuscarawas County Fair.  The boys and I are very active with our Local 4-H and so the first 2 weeks of September are spent getting ready for the Fair, and the last week is spent recovering from it.  The boys once again raised Market Hogs to show and sell at in the Jr. fair livestock competitions, and this year for the first time Robbie & Tony took Market Goats.  I had the 4-H booth to design, and  create, a vendor booth for Close To My Heart (with 2 other consultants) so I needed  items ready to sell, and on top of it all I decided to enter several items into the Fine Arts competition for stamping and photography  (what was I thinking :-)  Of course I had to get all this done around work and chasing kids. 

Dillon is #75

Tony #82

Tony & Dillon are both playing football which means at least 3 games a week, and practice every other day.  Of course with Tony being in a Freshman and Dillon only in 7th grade they both play on 2 different teams so of course their games are at different times and I have to coordinate schedules. 





Jimmy is working at Wendy's and has his own car so I don't have to worry about getting him from A to B anymore, and I am loving the fact that I can use him for pick up and delivery of his brothers when he isn't working. 

Because the boys have animals at the fair and I had the CTMH booth, we all took the week off work/school and had a camper set up at the fair, and we enjoyed a weeks vacation of action packed events.  It wall started off with decorating the hog barns Friday night (I skipped the varsity football game, to do this), then on Saturday we had Hog Weigh-In's, the camper was set up, my Fine Arts Entries were turned in and I started decorating the 4-H booth.  This year we lucked out and all 4 hogs were in the prime weigh classes, with Dillon's hog Two-Face weighing 260 lbs, Tony's hog Baby weighing 268 lbs, Jimmy's hog Ida Kno weighing 270 lbs, and finally Robbie's hog Lola weighing 275 lbs.  Surprisingly with all 4 hogs weights being so close none of the boys were in the same weight class. 




Dillon at weigh-ins with his an Jimmy's hogs.




Sunday started bright and early with the boys getting their pictures with their hogs for the buyers signs, then Robbie and Tony went and got the goats, Jimmy and Dillon moved into the camper, while I worked on getting the 4-H booth finished set up.  The goats both made weight with Robbie's Bubba weighing in at 80lbs and Tony's Leroy weighing 85lbs.  Then finally at 6pm after the 4-H booth was done Karen, Betty and I set up our Close To My Heart booth, and we were all ready for the week to begin. 



this years 4-H booth



Monday was the Opening day of the fair and the boys school actually didn't have classes this day so they hung out with their friends while I ran the CTMH booth. 

On Tuesday it was Show day for the Hogs and I took the day off from watching the CTMH booth. The boys & their hogs did fairly well this year Robbie, Jimmy, and Tony all got 5th place in their weight classes and Dillon got 9th, not bad and we all got done in time for Tony to make football practice and Dillon to make his football game.







Robbie & Lola,
Lola got 5th place in her weight class




Jimmy & Ida Kno
Ida got 5th place in her weight class




Tony & Baby
Baby got 5th place in her weight class



Dillon & Two-Face
Two-Face got 9th in her weight class


Then on Wednesday (It wasn't a good day) I watched the CTMH booth in the morning, then the boys had How showmanship at 4pm.  While I was on my way to the hog arena my Aunt and Granny stopped me, wanting to find my Dad cause my Mom had fallen and was being taken to the hospital by ambulance.  (Panic time) Luckily it didn't take long for us to find him, and while my Aunt, Granny, Dad, and Brother's family went to the hospital to be with Mom I got to watch the boys do showmanship.  It was not a good year for the boys in showmanship, Dillon did a good job showing but didn't make the final cut, Tony was complemented by the judge and you could tell he really wanted Tony in the final cut but Baby had other ideas and would not cooperate.  Jimmy did make the final cut and ended up with 5th place, Robbie automatically got first place as he was the only 18 year old showing.  Wednesday night finished with us in the ER again as Jhett, a good friend of Jimmy's,  was hurt on a ride and taken by ambulance to the hospital, so it made for a long night.

Thursday came and made up for the events of Wednesday.  Our day started bright and early as we had made arrangements the night before to help get Jhett's goat ready for the show, as we weren't sure he would be out of the ER in time to show.  (He made it with 10 minutes to spare).  This was our first year of taking goats so we were a little unsure what the judge would be looking for, though Dani did a wonderful job teaching Robbie how to show a goat cause Robbie got 2nd place in the 1st year showmanship class.  Once we got to the individual weight classes where they judged the goat and not the 4-H we hit jackpot.  Robbie got first place in his weight class!!!  Then Tony got last in his weight class, bummer but he has a couple of years left to show, for Robbie it was his last harrah. 


Robbie and Bubba getting first place in Weight Class 2




Tony walking Leroy in Weight Class 3


the best part of Thursday was when they brought in all the first and second place goats from the 4 weight classes and the judge picked out Bubba as the 2011 Tuscarawas County Fair Grand Champion Market Goat.  I don't know who had the bigger smile, Robbie or Dani. 





Robbie and Dani with the Grand Champion banner
and Bubba in front of the Ag-Land booth
where Dani works and the buyers of Bubba


After the goat show on Thursday, the rest of the week went pretty quickly.  the boys sold their hogs Thursday night and got the best overall price per pound we have gotten since they started taking hogs.  Jimmy got $3.25 a pound, Robbie & Tony got $2.75 a pound and Dillon got $2.50 a pound, we were very please with the results.  Friday was pretty much a wind down day as Tony & Dillon had the varsity football game that night, and the rest of us just hung out at the fair.  Saturday the boys sold the goats with Robbie getting $750 for Bubba and Tony getting $225 for Leroy.   Sunday came and we were in clean up mode, we cleaned out the camper, the animal pens,  tore down our booths, and said goodbye to all our fair friends for another year.  In all the 2011 Tuscarwas County Fair was a good one, and we were all sad/happy to see it come to an end.




This is the make shift sign that this display
made after my Mom fell when she missed the
step.  I of course had to snap a picture of
it for her scrapbook.



One Graduation down, 3 to go

It has been a few days since I last posted. Durng the 2 weeks I have been MIA lots have things have been going on. I will post just a few pictures of our activities, and give you a brief run down of the last to weeks.

On Memorial day Dillon and his baseball team were in the Tusky parade, then they played a baseball game against the other Tusky Little League team immediately after the Memorial day services.  He has had a total of 4 games since Memorial day. 

Dillon #3 on third base

Dillon Batting in another game

Dillon Batting again at a different game.

Then for added excitement and some spoiling of my favorite nephew Croft we went to see 2 of my niece Sunny's softball games.

Sunny Pitching

Robbie holding Croft

We have also gotten our 4-H hogs and goats for this year.  So now I have 6 hogs in my back yard along with 2 goats at Dani's house.  Now We just need to get Jimmy & Dillon's Vegetable garden planted and we will have a good start on this years 4-H projects.

The Boys market hogs in the back of the truck waiting to be unloaded

The highlight of the last 2 weeks was Robbie's graduation party.  It was June 4th  and we had a pretty good turn out.  Despite me waiting to the last minute (my sisters statement) everything came together nicely.  I managed to get most of what I wanted done in time before the party.  I didn't get all the pages done for his scrapbook that I wanted to, but the only one who missed them was me.  I will be posting the last few pages I got done, some using the CTMH flip flaps, along with his thank you notes here soon in another post.

Robbie getting ready to cut his cake

The Cake, I had originally ordered it with Red & Black Roses
But changed the order when Robbie informed me that the
cake had better not have roses on it.

The Warren Township Center Decorated for the party

The card box and 3 of his Sr pictures, I love them in Black & White

Robbie and Dani were put in charge of creating the picture display and setting up his momento's table.  They did a wonderful job, maybe a little of my creativity has rubbed off on them

This end of the table was his sports memorabilia.
It includes his baseball trophies, sports scrapbook
His Sr. wrestling Collage, his wrestling trophies& medals
and his grungy old  wrestling  head gear.

This has his picture board, his life scrapbook, only partially done
His Ag & Diesel certification, and the folder for his diploma



This area had all his and Dani's dance pictures, his 4-H trophies
along with his scholarship awards.



Here are the decorations from Robbie's party.  I was able to display my creativity in several ways from the banner I made at work showing Robbie at various stages of his life, to the table decorations.

This is the banner I created all by myself
using the graphics program and the giant vinyl printer
at Bates Metal Products  It has pictures of Robbie through out
the last 18yrs with the 2 big pictures being one of him as a baby
and the other is one of his Sr. Pictures
I will get a better picture of it later and post.

I made 16 of these in school colors with the diamond plated
frames (used silver metalic paper & cuttlebug embossing folder)

You might reconize these as the favors I made for my nephews baby shower.  They have pictures of Robbie as a child on one side and one of his Sr pictures on the other.  On my first version I tied them together with ribbon, well since Robbie isn't a Ribbon type of guy I found some twine I had in my hobby room and used that instead.  It gave them a very rustic feel I think.  These served a dual purpose, as we used these not only as table decorations, but also as our balloon anchors.  We tied our ballons onto a box them put a rock in the bottom of each one to keep them from floating away.

Close up of table decorations

In between getting Ready for Robbie's party I had to also make gifts for all the Sr. Wrestlers on the team.  I have been taking hundreds of  pictures of the boys every year since they were in 8th grade and made each of them a disk with their pictures and memorable team pictures on it.  When it came time to package the cd and create my graduation card for the boys, I combined them both and created this.  On the inside flaps there was a picture of the wrestler that we used on their Sr. Banner, and one of them wrestling, the center is my card for the boys.  The outside is black with school paper and stamped title,  I used the frame as a tuck in closure them for added strength I add a little velcro to keep them shut.

Now that Robbie's Party is over it is time to move onto the next one.  So Jimmy just to let you know You are now important. LOL



Jimmy saying don't let his brothers know he is the important one now. LOL



Lucky WOTG

I have to admit that my favorite paper pack in the Spring/Summer catalog just happens to be the Lucky paper pack.  I love it because it is very boyish, and I have all kinds of ideas of pictures I want to use with it.  Though Close To My Heart Corporate really helped me decide one layout I wanted to do.  My boys are in the pictures featured on the Lucky WOTG flyer (page 41), so of course I had to duplicate their layout.  I did the layout last night but made a couple of changes.  In the original layout it featured a 6x8 picture of all 4 of them, and then a 3x3 of them goofin off, along with individual 3x3 pictures of my oldest 2.  I wanted to add the individuals ofthe other 2 somewhere in the layout so I made some changes.

Workshops on the Go (WOTG) are kits that contain a level 2 paper pack, a Exclusive B size My Acrylix Stamp Set, plus an embellishment all for a discounted price of $29.95

Here is the original corporate layout.

No here is my version with the additional pictures.



Materials Used: Lucky WOTG, Outdoor Denim & Desert Sand Ink,
Liquid Glass to attach buttons



Left Side No Changes





Right Side changes made
Added Sunset Strip, and 2 3x3 pictures
shortened Journal box

MIA - wow can't believe I have not posted in over a month

Boy did February fly by.  Wrestling season has ended, Robbie has wrestled his last match ever, I am really going to miss watching him and the rest of the Seniors wrestle.

The Sr's Final Rolling up  of the mats.
After every home meet the wrestlers have to help
roll up the mats and take them back to the wrestling room.
this was these boys last time ever and yes there were
plenty of tears that night.  including the big bad wrestlers.:-)

Robbie Didn't make it to districts as he lost his final match in 4 overtimes.  I was really disappointed that he didn't make it, especially since he had soundly beat the 4th place kid before.  His last match was the match of a lifetime against his least favorite opponent from Sandy Valley, they wrestled an awesome match and it really should have been the 3rd and 4th place match, but unfortunately due to the way the bracket was set up it was the semi-final round in consulation, so the winner moved on to wrestle for 3rd and 4th and loser got 5th as the 6th place wrestler was disqualified for unsportsman like conduct.

Robbie on the podium in 5th place at sectionals.

 Tony Wrestled in the Jr. High Districts on February 20 and managed to get hurt in his second match.  Though he did wrestle and lose a close match after he got injured.  He told me and his coach that his shoulder didn't hurt that bad before the third match.  I really wonder how much he wasn't telling us about the shoulder cause I had him at the ER the following Tuesday with shoulder pain.

Tony in his last match of the season. 
He is already looking forward to next season.

During the month of February I got to know our local ER staff quite well as I made 3 trips, in 3 weeks, with 3 different kids.  Jimmy started it all by falling while playing basketball at a friend's house on February 13, he ended up separating his right shoulder, thus putting an end to his high school baseball career as he missed all of tryouts.  Then on February 22, I had Tony in the ER for a strained left shoulder that he had injured wrestling on the Sunday before. Finally on February 28, I had Dillon at the ER cause he injured his thumb playing basketball with the neighbors.  Dillon's thumb is fractured and he is in a cast.  All 3 are going to the same Orthopedic Dr.  so I have been able to combined appointments. 2 injuries from playing basketball in one month, guess that is what happens when you let wrestlers play with balls. LOL


Dillon Sporting his blue cast.

 We have had lots of snowy and rainy  weather during the last 6 weeks, starting with a ice storm the first of February, and hopefully ending with the heavy wet snow we had last Friday.  The snow on Friday laid heavy in the trees creating a beautiful winter wonderland outside. 

My view from my front door

My view out my backdoor

Of course all this snow and rain has to go somewhere and it looks like the boys are going to be out of school for a couple more days as the roads between us and the school are all flooded and the water is still rising.  This marks the 3rd flood in that last 6 years that has closed down the school.  I went to the same school the boys are going to for 13 years and we never had floods so bad that the roads were covered, wonder what has changed since I was in school.

Well that is pretty much the recap of what I have been upto for the last 6 weeks.  During the little free time during the last couple of weeks I have been able to get some more layouts done for Robbie's scrapbook.  I will be posting those on here in the next couple of days.

No Peeking Edition #3 (Mom I know you have already looked :-)

Ok this is the last gift I have done and ready for the H2H challenge.  This is a 6x6 accordian album completed using the Mistletoe Level 1 kit.  I got this Idea from several ladies on the Close  To My Heart Consultant Bulletin Boards, sorry girls I don't remember exactly who you all, but THANKS A MILLION.  This is an album from our Christmas in 2008 when we spent it in the cabin in Tennessee.  It is a gift for my mother-in-law.  Though I like it so much I think I am going to have to recreate it again for me.




 


The inside pages

Front & Back Cover with center pages



The Front cover.  the picture is of an old rake that they have sitting in front of
the cabin with a wreath on it.  Ken remembers having to ride on the seat when making hay.
I only have several pictures of the rake, I take a dozen or so everytime we are there.




This is the first pages.  It shows how my In-Laws had the cabin decorated when we got there.

 




The second set of pages.




the back cover





The center back pages.

 This project came together really quickly.  I did in all the white edges of the album in New England Ivy Ink.  I used the Mistletoe level 1 kit and cut the base pages into 6x6 squares.  Then played around with my pictures and decide on my order. Then went through and double matted all my pictures.  I also matted all the MyStickEase onto at least one sheet of cardstock for dimension and cut out.  The funnest part was Creating the Merry Christmas "M" and the Packages and Holly Embellishments.  For these I stamped the image in New England Ivy on my base  and cut out (for the Merry Christmas I didn't cut it out.)  I then stamped the image again on the Cranberry side of the snowflake B&T, I used New England Ivy for the M and Cranberry for the rest.  I then cut them out (yes I am insane when it comes to fine cutting I enjoy doing it).  Then I paper Pieced the Cranberry over top the same image on the base.  Of course for the Gifts and Holly I thought they needed a little more dimension so i mounted them on Colonial White Cardstock and Cut them out again.  Did I mention that the fine cutting for me is relaxing?  Here is a close up ofthe gift & holly.

Close up of the gifts

Close up of the Holly

Materials Used all CTMH unless otherwise noted:  Mistletoe Level 1 Paper pack and My Stickease.  St. Nick  Stamp Set, Cranberry, New England Ivy, Colonial White Card Stock, Mistletoe Level 2 Assortment, CTMH Cranberry Ribbon, Gold Ribbon I had in my stash, Foam Tape.

Hope you enjoyed viewing all the gifts I have made so far.  Now it is time to hurry back to my craft room to make more wonderful items.  Please feel free to leave a comment.