Write My Life

Each winter we take the girls on a trip to play in the snow. This year instead of heading to Yosemite, we headed to the gold country in Calavaras Country. We rented a cottage in Murphys and drove north past Arnold to the Spicer SNO-PARK. At Spicer, there are lots of unofficial sledding hills and areas for play.

Our children prefer to have their own spot so we often find places that are less crowded. At Spicer if you just walk a little bit off the path, you can leave the crowds of people.

The snow was packed so it wasn’t the best for building a snowman or tossing snowballs. We did do some sledding, though.

Our greatest snow achievement this year was the grand ice cave we created on a hillside at Spicer SNO-PARK.

It started as a simple igloo or tunnel that Jackie dug. She used her hands to dig snow out of the hill or she climbed into her hole and dug snow out with her feet. Mike joined in, helping her made a deep hole. It got so deep that Jackie could put most of her body into it.

With effort and a few tools (tree bark and a broken branch), Mike, Jackie and Jennifer created a tunnel leading from one hole to the other whole.

Jennifer was the first to travel through the entire length of the cave, going in on her end and coming out on Jaclyn’s end. She was thrilled.

We were able to open the hole a little wider and Jackie traversed the whole cave as well.

For our snow play adventure, we stayed at a cottage in Murphys, CA. The Church Street Cottage had two bedrooms, two bathroms, a kitchen, dining room and living room. It was so nice to have all this space for relaxing after playing in the snow. We relaxed by drinking hot chocolate, eating meals and reading books. The cottage allowed dogs, which gave us the opportunity to bring the dogs along on the trip. They enjoyed relaxing as well.

As strange as it may seem, I enjoyed taking time to cook our dinners. What isn’t strange is how I enjoyed having Mike do the dishes after our meals.

It’s been a long time, but this year we took the dogs with us on our vacation. We had several reasons and it all worked out well. The dogs enjoyed being with us, playing in the snow and getting to take many walks.

Merlin, 14, stumbled a bit on the snow but enjoyed it. He barked whenever we would stop walking. He didn’t want to sit still!

Arthur, 10, had plenty of energy! When we did stop, he would instantly climb into my lap for cuddling. He was so lap happy that when I got into a sled he joined me and sledded down a very small hill on my lap.

It’s time for a challenge!

Here are some ideas to keep you scrapping the next month.  I’ll share mine on February 15.

Photography Challenges:

• Take a photograph of something that inspires you.
• A second challenge is to get down and take a photograph of something or someone with you looking up.
• Take it one challenge farther and take a photograph of something or someone with you looking down.

Digital Challenge:

• Create a journaling block digitally, including a digital element (stamp, paper, etc.)

Journaling Challenges:

• Follow my advise and do journaling for a layout before creating the layout.
• Do a follow-up layout. Often we record an interest or a change and then leave it at that. Look back from a few years ago at some interests or changes. Have they remained the same? Have they changed? If so, how and why?

Layout Challenge: Use a scrapbook product for inspiration.

Sketch Challenge: Use this sketch to create a layout:

It looks simple enough. What can you do with it?

Have fun!

I am in the midst of writing two articles for Scrapjazz. Despite living in sunny California I am working on an article called Snowball Fight Photographs & Layouts. It helps that we take a trip to the snow in and/or near Yosemite every winter. Here is one I did today using pictures from last year’s trip.

The other article is Scrapping Events You Did Not Attend. That will be easy since I have all these business trips Mike takes without me…

Look for these at Scrapjazz in February.

Welcome Christmas 2007!

In the early hours of Christmas morning, everyone is allowed to open their stockings and Santa gifts as soon as they want to open them. Anyone who is around can watch. That generally does not include our late sleeper Elizabeth. Although Jennifer is usually a late sleeper she makes an exception on this day and Jennifer usually starts checking out her stocking first.

Then, Jackie opens hers as well.

This year Mike, Elizabeth and I had items in our stockings as well. Mike and I got several varieties of chocolate. Yum…

After stockings and breakfast, we wait for everyone to get dressed and ready. This can be the hardest part sometimes.

It has become tradition for the girls to hand out the presents to everyone. Large piles (especially for them) are created for each person.

We also open the first two presents with everyone watching. That makes the photo ops easier.

Then, we tear into the rest of the presents. We talk between opening things and show off our favorites new things or something special. We keep an eye out for people opening our presents to them.

Of coarse, the girls always take longer than the rest of us to go through their presents. Wonder why???

Last Spring our girls entered the world of Webkinz. Jackie enjoys them still but Jennifer was wishing to hard for one this year. She would look at each package arriving, hoping it was a a Webkinz. One day she said to me sadly, “I can tell from the size of the packages that I am not getting a Webkinz.” Little did she know…

…Mommy has no problem putting things in boxes bigger than the object. Thanks for Grandma and Grandpa, Jennifer now has a new Beagle and Jackie has a Clydesdale horse. Some days I love being sneaky.

For Jennifer Webkinz have become a tool for making friends at school. They bring their Webkinz to school, meet, greet and play together. It has been a way of bonding for Jennifer and the girls at her new school. It doesn’t have to be a Webkinz as Jennifer has brought other stuffed animals as well, but the girls really like the Webkinz and they can be put them on their “friends” list on the Webkinz website.