a bag of chips

Hello from Tina's new iMac.

Hello, Internet!  Tina's new iMac, here, atop her dusty desk in her messy, cold scrap studio/spider haven. I guess this is better than that box I arrived in, all soaking wet and gross. Eeeew. Those folks at FedEx sure know how to treat a guy. Or am I a girl? I'm awfully big and pretty. Hmmm. I'll get back to you on that.

Anyway, here I am. Sleek, sophisticated and quiet. I bet that pathetic little PC sitting over there all dark and pissed off is wondering what the hell happened, and is probably just realizing his nards are now all shriveled and tiny and traveling upward to rest somewhere high inside, probably near his constricting throat and quivering chin. And once my new owner figures my shit out, he'll likely become nothing more than a plaything for the three rugrats I heard screaming earlier. (Yeah, that's right buddy! You wanna piece of me? What's that? Oh, really? How about I come over there and beat you with your CPU? Thought so.)

Ahem. Pardon me. 

Well, I guess I shouldn't be too rude to the poor bastard just yet. Until all the software she needs gets installed and all her files get transferred and moved on over, she'll have to lower herself to his level a few more times before he can be totally dead to her. Ha! She and I are both looking forward to that.

Anyway, Tina and I have some bonding to do, so I better get going. Just wanted to make sure I stopped by to introduce myself.

Chat soon!

PS If any of you wonderful Mac users out there have any tips or keyboard gotta-knows you'd like to pass along, I'd appreciate it. She's got years of PC walls to break down in order for us to work more seamlessly together, though I must say she seems to be pretty happy with me so far. I'd love to show you the goofy look on her face right now, but she doesn't know how to use my camera just yet.

Reduce, re-use, recycle.

The other night, as we were decorating our tree, I took the opportunity to organize our holiday decorations and to purge our collection of holiday whatnots from Christmases past. Among the treasures I unearthed was more than a decade of old holiday cards from my husband's pre-Tina past.  And with those old cards I decided to make those adorable geometric holiday balls using my handy-dandy Stampin' Up! Big Shot and the 3-D Circle Ornament die. The die does the cutting and scoring, and I did the folding and assembling:

I made these four balls white watching some detective whodunnit shows on the boobtube while my favorite boob slept and snored on the couch. The four took about 1.5 hours and required no cursing. (Because you know, the number of hours and curse words is how I gauge project difficulty. Don't you?)  I plan to make a few more and then attach green and red ribbon to each one with a brad and hang them just out of arms reach of my little rascals.

I'm still working on getting all caught up on my December Daily postings, but I wanted to get this fun little project posted, too.

Tagged (and a bit tardy about it).

The one and only Stacy Julian tagged me the other day to post the fourth photo in the fourth folder on my computer. And I present to you my nephew Dylan, in May this year, riding his bike without training wheels, his daddy not far behind:

Dylan loves his daddy, and his daddy loves him. I adore these photos of the two of them having fun, bonding over wheeled things like guys do.

Thanks, Stacy!

I challenge Allison, Margaret, Melissa and Candice (and any other bloggers who are reading this) to take this challenge. It's a nice walk down memory lane!

December Daily (the missing week, part two).

And here are the rest up to day ten. Because both of my camera batteries had no juice in them. Look for the rest tomorrow. Really!

Day 7:

Day 8:

Day 9:

Day 10:

I have really been enjoying this daily project, watching each day come together but not struggling to do or make something amazing each day. If nothing particularly Christmas-y or crafty happened (see day 7 and day 5), I just share about our relaxing, holiday stress-free day.  My original album also had a center page or insert for almost each day, and in several instances (like day 10 above) I have removed that insert because I simply don't have enough to fill it all up.

I have used so many different products in my book that it's not possible to share them all here, but if you have any questions about anything you see in my book, feel free to ask!!!

On another note, I have ordered my iMac (holy freakin' cow, I can't believe it!) and it's due to arrive on my rather wet doorstep on Wednesday (holy freakin' cow, I can't believe it!). I got the biggest and best iMac and I plan to spend most of my waking hours in the next two weeks playing with it and re-learning a whole new way of computering.

My new photography business website is also still in the works and will be revealed by the end of the year. I'm so excited about it and can't wait to share it with you.  My camera and I had some incredible new adventures this year and I am really, really, really excited about what 2009 will bring.

Anyway, my mom is here for a visit and I plan to get the rest of my shopping done tonight while she babysits.

Toodles!

December Daily (the missing week).

Without further ado, here is part of what I haven't shared yet from my December Daily album. Keeping up with the scrapping part of it hasn't been so tough - it's been the finding-the-time-to-photograph-it-and-share-it-here part that's been kinda problematic. So sorry!

Day 3:

Day 4:

Day 5:

Day 6:

And now, since it's time to get kids from school, days seven thru 14 to follow later this evening.
Really!

Crash.

Well, not exactly, but pretty damn close.

Sometime between Thursday night and Friday morning (when I had a conference call scheduled with my amazing designer to walk through setting up my new website - freakin' figures), a bug got into my computer, despite having Norton and all manner of protections, and messed with my settings.  I couldn't get on the internet. I could IM and get email through Outlook, so I know I could connect to the outside. I just couldn't get any of my browsers (yes, three different browsers - IE, Firefox and Safari) to connect.

So, here I am - FINALLY - after spending HOURS with the very kind and helpful folks at Dell (seriously, they saved me from taking my computer to the nearest twenty-story building and pitching this f***ing computer from the roof). The end result was I had to reinstall Windows XP from scratch. Yes. Reinstalled my operating system.  Everything on my hard drive (which was mostly backed-up) was overwritten and is now brand spanking blank, and rather speedy.

Lessons learned: 

HANG ON TO THE DISCS THAT YOU GET WITH YOUR COMPUTER AND THEN PUT THEM SOMEPLACE WHERE YOU CAN FIND THEM. I found all but one of them (thank GOD I found those) and the missing one contained drivers which I downloaded from Dell's website. Without the Windows XP Reinstallation disc in my hand, I would have had to wait until they came in the mail. That would not have been good.

STORE A COPY OF ACTIONS AND OTHER DOWNLOADED FILES ON A DISC OR EXTERNAL MEMORY DRIVE.  Most of my action files were stored on my external hard drive, but a few were not. I'll be calling around tomorrow to see if anyone will take pitty on my frustrated soul.

BUY AN EXTENDED WARRANTY ON YOUR COMPUTER PURCHASES. Twice in the last three months I have needed the people at Dell and they've exceeded my expectations each time. The first was a broken power source. Within 24 hours of my call, a nice man came to my home and installed a new power source. For FREE.  And the six hours over the last three days I've spent with their techno squad on their toll-free hotline to troubleshoot and resolve my problem was beyond helpful and they were all very friendly. And spoke English.

BUY A MAC. Which I will be doing before year's end. Now I know that Macs are not without their faults, but they are reportedly virtually impervious to viruses (virii???) and other pc-happy pathogens, and the best for photography and graphics. Ahhhhhh. This recent problem was the proverbial straw that broke that doggone camel's back. I'll be sportin' a new iMac very, very, very soon. (Thanks, honey, for finally caving. You're da bomb.)

So, that's my excuse for not being around much these last few days. Now that I'm (mostly) back up and running, look for a flurry of December Daily stuff coming tomorrow.

How did you spend your weekend?

December Daily - Update!

Here are my first two days:

So far, so good. I'm enjoying an easy-going, don't-make-myself-crazy approach to my little project (great advice from Ali), and if you're doing one, remember to do the same.

Need some December Daily inspiration? 

December Daily Flickr Group
Jamie Waters
Melissa Deakin
Janelle Wind
Nicole Harper

Happy scrapping!

Eight years ago I married the man of my dreams.
Eight years ago I officially became the happiest woman on Earth.
And here we are, eight short years later and still, just the sound of his deep, sing-song voice makes my toes curl.

You amaze me, my love. Thank you for the best eight years of my life. I look forward to many, many more.

Another cover!!!

Be on the lookout for the Jan/Feb 2009 Simple Scrapbooks magazine:

Photo by me and darling layout by Margaret Scarbrough (one of my favorite scrappers and my awesome co-host at the Sweetwater House a few months back).

Not that anyone but me is counting, but this is my fifth cover photo. My sixth will be on the March/April 2009 issue. I am equal parts stunned and excited (as in choking back a squeal and the urge to show everyone in the store) each time I see something that I created on the cover or inside the magazine. It never gets old. Ever.

In fact, so many people have asked about how to get published. And all I can say is just keep submitting. That's all I did until one day something caught someone's eye. In fact, go here to see what the current calls are for the May/June 2009 issue. Go on! Give it a shot!