My kids aren't photogenic.

Apparently they don't believe in smiling, or looking at the camera, or holding still for the 1.2 seconds it takes me to take a picture. Whatever.

At any rate, the princess and the zebra went trick or treating last night. Matt worked a day shift so that he could take them out, and I stayed home distribut

ing candy and watching 'Treehouse of Horror' episodes on TV. We didn't have a lot of kids come around, so I got stuck with a lot of extra candy. I got the stuff I like (read: chocolate) so that's either a good thing or a bad thing.

The kids had a great time, although I don't think Porter really got it. His favorite was the one house that had a soccer ball sign in the yard; Porter yelled "BAAALLLLL!" all the way up to the house. (You should hear the way he says ball: he sounds like a Mexican soccer announcer. GOOOOAAALLLL!) For what it's worth, Porter figured out how to say "Trick or treat!" this morning. Good job, buddy.

Croptoberfest!

I'm not going to

write this whole post in haiku.

It would take too long.

So, I'm back from Croptoberfest, and what a fun time it was! It took less than two hours to drive to Fort Wayne (hint: do not take SR 32 to exit 19, even if it looks like it is more direct)

so I was only a little late. We had the whole day to crop at the huge tables in the back of Luv2Scrapbook, plus tons of food, free goodies, and more! I got a lot done - 2 double-page spreads and 4 or 5 single-page layouts - but I probably would have gotten MORE done if I wasn't having such a good time chatting!

I finally got to see some of the ladies I've known on the message boards for almost 2 years. I'm thrilled that they came into the store because they knew I'd be there! This adorable lady is Sue, a.k.a. Tinkie - I recognized her right away by her Tinkerbell hat and jacket! Her very patient husband entertained himself while we discussed the merits of DCWV cardstock. Gotta love the white core!

And here you see me displaying my usual sense of dignity, along with Mary, one of the ladies who was at my table. We got prizes by completing various challenges, some of which were scrap related, some weren't. This one obviously wasn't.

Since it was a Western theme, one of the challenges was to ride a stick horse around the entire store. It's a lot less embarrassing if you have someone else to do it with you!

Carrie from the Luv2 message came into the store and I got
to meet her too. Dang it! I totally forgot to get a picture! But I did get to see her adorable KI tin calendar project before practically everyone else in the world, and it is adorable!

The fabulous chick in the orange turtleneck is OrangeKrsssh, aka. Susan. I've been dying to meet Susan at least since the Meijer layout, if not longer. We chatted about photos - I got to see themiraculously returned camera - and scrapbooking in general and Hall of Fame and Vegas and sparkly shoes. Took some pictures which she has already scrapbooked (I know, I'm impressed, too).

The last picture is me and Kristy - you can tell it was late in the evening, since I'd pulled my hair back - my friend from the Scrapbook Corner design team. Kristy moved to Ft. Wayne recently (but she still drives down for classes and design team meetings, which is truly impressive) so after joining in the second half of the crop, she not only graciously let me crash at her place, she even shipped her kids off to the grandparents! Kristy showed me all her stuff for the Crop for the Cure garage sale; she made up over a hundred little kits out of her scraps and I feel better now about the amount of paper I have! I got to sleep on Batman sheets, which I'm hoping will give me superhero-like scrapping ability (hey, I'm just covering all my bases here!) It was really nice to sleep over and not have to drive home that night.

But, it felt really good to come home this morning. I swear, the kids have actually gotten cuter.

And, by the way, the shirt? I've had a lot of people ask where I got it. Actually, I bought the T-shirt at Kohls and some iron-on letters at Hobby Lobby, and I did the rest myself. And if you know how much I hate ironing, you know that's a major sacrifice!

It's important to accessorize.

According to the calendar, it's another 5 days until Halloween.

Try telling that to my daughter.

We went to Target today and bought seven bags of candy which I am trying very hard to ignore. Also, I got the treat bags made for the kids. It took me about an hour (and yes Mom, we all know you would have had them done in five minutes) plus Betsy got some accessories made from the scraps. Check out her belt and her little hair tie. Anyway, she knew there was supposed to be a purse to complete the ensemble, so she came in the kitchen and was watching me sew. By the time I got to the last seam, she was so excited she was literally jumping up and down.

I'm glad that it's so easy to make this child happy.

Now we just have to hope it stops raining before Trunk or Treat tomorrow night.

I can't think of a witty title for this post.

I just realized it's been more than a week since my last post. Geez, where does the time go? Let's see... NCIS was a repeat this week, Betsy is still pooping in diapers, and I still haven't finished the baby doll coat. (I'm having to hand sew all that *&^$%& bias tape, which is a particularly grueling and thankless task.) I did go to Joann's yesterday and pick up some Halloween print fabric for 99 cents a yard. I'm going to sew some treat bags for the kids, since they'll fit more easily into storage than the old school plastic pumpkins. (Not that I don't love the pumpkins, mind you.) I'll need to get those done before Trunk or Treat tomorrow night, but I think they'll be easy. I'm using a 12x12 square of chipboard as a pattern... quick and easy, I hope.

I also went to Old Navy yesterday. I got this really cute pair of black crocheted espadrilles for, you guessed it, 97 cents.

On Saturday, I'm heading up to Fort Wayne for Croptoberfest, a massive all-day crop at Luv2Scrapbook. I've been haunting their message board for almost two years, but I've never been there before. Of course, most of my MB buddies won't be there, since they all went to the Anniversary Crop in May, which was shortly before Porter stopped nursing, the little ingrate. But still, I think it will be wicked fun, and I hope to get a lot done on my Hall of Fame entry. As of now I have all of my assignment pages planned, EXCEPT for the 'Original technique' one, though I'm guessing I'm not alone on that, lol! Anyway, I'm staying overnight at a friend's house in Fort Wayne, which will be my first time away from the kids since... hmmm... Time Out for Women, back when I was (barely) pregnant with Porter. (Speaking of which, TOFW will be in Indy in September /07! Way cool!) And as much as I love the little boogers, I really can't wait to get away from them fro a little while.

Self-portrait time

The Creating Keepsakes Hall of Fame contest rules state that all photography must be your own original work. I want to include some pictures of myself in my HOF entry... thank goodness for the self timer on my camera! These are my favorite two...




The first one is for Assignment C, 'Journal Your Passion.' As much as I love to scrapbook, I have loved to read for MUCH longer. I had to balance the camera on the arm of the sofa! I used Picasa to de-saturate the colors a bit, and I'll probably crop it down a lot before including it in the actual layout. (I have a larger one for the focal point which I took of my bookshelf. It sounds lame, but it actually turned out quite cool.)

The second one is for Assignment H 'Your Scrap Space.' Yep, that's my happy kitchen island. It's not the kind of scraproom you see inmagazines, but it seems to be working for me. And it sure beats living in the apartment, when I had to cram all of my supplies (and myself, if I wanted to get anything done) onto that little stair landing.