Remembering To Be Thankful

I guess my gratitude posts are turning into more of a weekly thing so here they are from the past week.  

Thursday, November 17th - I am so thankful that Dad has a job where he can occasionally meet me for lunch. I love our little tradition that we have established over the years and how I can talk to my dad about anything during these times. It is time set aside for us and he is constantly encouraging me and lifting me up.  I know that no matter where we end up, I have my dad there to lend a listening ear and uplifting words. 

Friday, November 18th - I am thankful for my sister Renee.  She is so amazing and she loves me for who I am. We have grown so much closer in the past few years and I love her so much. I am so thankful that God made us sisters and I know that there could be no one better than her. :)

Saturday, November 19th - I am so thankful for my friend Rosalie for so many reasons. She is an amazing friend and I love getting together with her to just catch up on life. She was my support system for me during that last year I worked at Arcola and she is the only good thing that came out of that year. And ever since then she has been such an encouragement to me as I struggle with finding a teaching job. She is truly amazing and I am so glad that God has put her in my life. 

Sunday, November 20th - I am so very thankful for quiet days at home where I can relax.  Whether it be spending time in my scrap room getting creative, watching a movie, or hanging out with my family, I love days when I don't have anywhere I need to be and my time is my own. Today was one of these days and I loved every minute of it. 

Monday, November 21st - I am so thankful that God gave me the desire, ability, and talent to be a teacher.  To be able to positively influence a child's life is the greatest privilege in the world. 

Tuesday, November 22nd - I know this sounds kind of lame, but I am thankful for television. The ability to know what is going on in the world around me is fantastic, and I also love that I can get totally lost in a good show and forget the cares of the world for awhile. 

Wednesday, November 23rd - I am thankful for traditions. I am the sort of girl who likes tradition. They are a way to connect with the past and they give is something to look forward to. They are familiar and comfortable. Just like our annual day before Thanksgiving shopping trips. They have become one of my favorite parts of this holiday because I just love spending time with my family. 

So Grateful...

Still trying to stay caught up on the gratitude posts, so here are mine from the past few days. 

Saturday, November 12th - I am grateful for the beautiful weather and being able to spend time outside with my family. 
Chatting with my parents and playing frisbee with Bailey... These are the things that matter most. 

Sunday, November 13th - I am grateful for my church, Pathway Community Church. It is a place where I feel like I truly belong. I have so many friends there and I am fed and encouraged each week by our amazing pastors. 

Monday, November 14th - I am so thankful that God has called me to be a teacher. It is so worthwhile to be able to positively influence children and I know that He has a plan for me on this one. 

Tuesday, November 15th - I am so thankful that God has given me a passion and a talent for photography. I love being able to capture the world around me and show God's beauty in everything, whether it be a flower, an animal or a child. 

Wednesday, November 16th - I am thankful for technology that allows me to connect to those around me. Whether it be a text to a friend to see if they are feeling better or a log post to share what is going on in my world or a phone call with my dad when he is out of town, I can stay in touch with the people who are most important to me. 

A Week of Gratitude

I can't believe it's been a whole week since I posted! I guess life just has just been getting in the way and there is so much to do and be thankful for. So I am going to play catch up from the past week on this blog.  

Saturday, November 5th - I am so thankful for my family. They are so amazing and love me for just who I am. :)

Sunday, November 6th - Today on my birthday I give thanks to the one who gave me life, my birth mom. I may not know who she is but I am so grateful that she chose to have me instead of getting an abortion. I am also so grateful that she chose to give me up and that God placed me with the most amazing, loving, and supportive parents ever!

Monday, November 7th - I am so thankful for the friends that God has placed into my life. They make me laugh and I enjoy hanging out with them so much. Thanks to each one of you who made my birthday so amazing with your birthday wishes. :)

Tuesday, November 8th - I am thankful for the substitute teaching jobs that I have gotten this year. When I am in the classroom, it just feels so right and I know that this is what God wants me to do with my life. 

Wednesday, November 9th - I am so thankful for my amazing friend Emily. God placed her in my life 21 years ago and she has blessed my life in so many ways. We have experienced life together and I am so glad that we are still such good friends. 

Thursday, November 10th - I am thankful that God gave us music so that we could express our love for Him with it. I was at a christian concert tonight and I love how a group of believers can get together and praise Jesus and have fun too. 

Friday, November 11th - today is Veteran's Day and I am so very thankful for our servicemen and women who have served our country and risked their lives to protect our freedom!

Thankful...

Ok here goes.  I have tried and failed to post this blog 2 times now and I am a bit frustrated with Blogger.  I get the entire thing written out and go to post...and poof! the whole post is gone! :(

So anyways I am going to sum up both Thursday and Friday's thankfulness posts.

Thursday, November 3rd - Today I am thankful for the young adult group at my church called Threefold.  It is a group specifically for those of us who are in our 20's and 30's where we can grow our faith and grow in community.  I love being part of this dynamic group of people every Thursday night and being challenged and fed every week.  I am on the leadership team and it is so great to see God working through this group to further His kingdom.  Every week our awesome youth pastor Nate Haywood teaches us about Christ and challenges us to be more active and involved in our faith.  We also have praise and worship which is such an intimate time with my Lord and Savior....love it!

Another fantastic part of this group is the people that attend.  They are all so amazing and friendly and encouraging.  I have grown very close to so many of them and feel blessed that God has given them to me. :)  I love being able to be open and myself with them and we have so much fun together.  We usually go hang out somewhere after Threefold (usually Applebee's) and we have a ton of fun and laugh a lot too! This is why Thursday is my absolute favorite day of the week!

Friday, November 4th - I am so thankful for the gift that God has given to us, His children in creation.  Everything in the world around us whispers His name, from the warm sun to the falling leaves.  I love being able to revel in His amazing creativity and design.  It is all so perfect and it works together so perfectly....there is absolutely no way that it all happened by chance. And when I get a chance to see His creation and how perfect His plan for creation was, I am reminded that His plans for me are perfect too.  :)

I will be back later tonight with today's post...there is still more day to be reminded of all that God has given me! :)

An Attitude of Gratitude

Today I am thankful for the gift of creativity that God has blessed me with. I was able to spend some time down in my scrap room, playing with my photos, paper, and glue today and it was awesome! It is times like these where I can get lost in my own little world (literally!) and be creative. Here is where I can let go of the stresses of life and unwind and relax. I love playing with colors and textures and finding just the right things from my stash to help me tell the story behind the photos.

A Month of Gratitude

Hello again my little blog. Long time no see. I have neglected you and let you sit idle and not taken the time to share my thoughts and makings with you and the world around me.

But no more. So today I embark on a month-long journey...a mission of gratitude, of remembering all that God has done for me, of all the wonderful people He has brought into my life, and of all the awesome things that He has done for me. Some days I will share pictures, and others I will just share my thoughts. I may even scrap about a few of them to share. So here goes...

Today I am thankful for my job at Archiver's. I work with some pretty amazing people and I get to share my love of scrapbooking and card-making with those around me. :)

** I ran across this today when I was looking for something on my computer and I thought it would be perfect to share here. :) **

1. What are your favorite scrapbook manufacturers?

-Right now I am really into Bo Bunny. Their stuff is so fresh and the colors are vibrant and fun...not to mention all the fun new accents. For cardstock, I am a Bazzill girl through and through. It is pretty much the only brand of cardstock I use. I love all the textures and I can always find cardstock to match my layout. I also use lots of Basic Grey, Hero Arts stamps, Tim Holtz products, American Crafts Thickers, and of course my Cricut.

 2. When did you start scrapping?

- I started scrapping back in 2000, when I was a senior in high school. I went on a couple of trips that year and I also had all of those high school memories to preserve. :) I went and visited my aunt and she introduced me to scrapbooking. That next week I headed to my local scrapbook store and picked up some supplies and created my first page. I was hooked!

3. How has your style evolved over the years?

-Looking back through my scrapbooks, I realize that my style has always stayed pretty consistent. Most of my layouts consist of multiple photos and each page has a story to tell. I like to use multiple patterned papers and a few key embellishments to tell my stories. Over the years, I have played with lots of different techniques on my scrapbook pages.  I think that this comes from working at various scrapbook stores throughout the years where I had to learn about all the latest and greatest.

4. How often do you scrap about yourself (or scrap pictures that you are in)?

-Most of the pages I scrapbook are about me. Since I am single, I scrap about my life. My family, holidays, travels, fun nights spent with friends, and even my dog. I try to hand off my camera to someone else or get pictures from friends and family to ensure that I am in at least some of the pictures. :)

5. Do you have any other crafty hobbies?

-I love to make cards. I make 75 cards a month for my church’s birthday card ministry, so that keeps me pretty busy. I also have dabbled in cross-stitching and miniatures but paper crafting has pretty much taken over my life.

6. Where do you get your creative inspiration?

- Most of my creative inspiration comes from sketches and other people’s layouts.  I usually end up altering some part of the design but it gives me a springboard for my ideas. Then  I am free to plug in my own pictures, patterned papers, colors and embellishments to create my layouts. Sometimes I will design my own layouts from scratch but most of the time I just want to concentrate on capturing my memories in a stress-free manner. 

7. What size pages do you normally scrap?

- I am definitely a 12x12 scrapper. Many of my layouts are double-page layouts. I love having the larger 12x24 inch space to play with and scrap multiple photos.

8. Do you have a favorite technique that you use on layouts or something that you think of as your signature?

- I love experimenting with different techniques on my layouts but a few of my favorites are using lots of photos on a page to tell my story, using border punches to add pizzazz to a strip of paper, and the ‘rule of 3s’ which is using 3 clusters of like objects on my pages, such as flowers, circles, or other embellishments. This technique is on just about every layout I make and I love how this look completes my pages.

9. Are you on any design teams?

-Currently I am not on any design teams. I was on the If It’s Groovy Blog design team from September 2009-May 2010 and I loved being challenged every month to create new layouts for the team.

10. Where is your favorite place to scrap? Is there a certain time of day that you prefer to scrap? (or when do you get the most scrapping done?)

-My favorite place to scrap is my scraproom because everything that I could ever possibly need (literally) is down there. I can go down there, turn on my favorite tunes, and get lost in my own little world. Right now I scrap whenever I have time.  Since I work retail, my hours are a bit crazy so some days I am working in the afternoon while everyone else is at work and other times I am working late at night when everyone else is asleep.

11. What does your scrap room/area look like?

- My scrap room is located in the finished portion of our basement. I have basically taken over and turned the space into my giant creative space. My desk sits facing another desk and a table so I can invite lots of people over to scrap with me. To the side of my desk is my computer and printer. Since I print all my own photos I use this quite a bit.  Then behind me is shelving that stores all my supplies, including patterned papers, stickers, ink, stamps, flowers, letters, chipboard, and my scrapbook albums.

12. Any tips on keeping all those scrap supplies organized?

-Organize the way you think about scrapbook supplies. For me I know my companies, so I tend to organize the bulk of my supplies by type and then by company.  If you scrap by color, then organize by color. If you scrap by event, organize by events. For example, most of my patterned paper is organized by company, but I do have some that is organized by event (holidays, birthdays, Disney, etc) and a little bit of it is organized by color.

Also always be on the lookout for new ways to organize your supplies. You never know where you will find the perfect organizing solution. For example, I keep all my border strips organized by color family in silverware keepers that I found at Bed, Bath and Beyond.  And compartmentalized tackle boxes hold my ribbon, eyelets, and brads.

13. Why do you scrap?

- I scrap because I love to preserve my photos and stories for me and my family. Before I started scrapping, I took lots of photos but they were always just sitting around in boxes or in photo albums. I never actually got them out or looked at them. When I started scrapping, I got those photos out of the boxes and added my personal story to them. I also love playing with paper and being creative. Scrapbooking has been a wonderful outlet for me to share my thoughts and feelings.  I am able to put what is in my heart onto my pages and record and remember the little things that make me who I am.