I’ve just started my first altered book. Actually, I’m heading an altered book project at scrapthemoment.com. I’m so excited to be heading a project that I conceived of and have set up, and I can’t wait to get into it in full force. The whole idea is to turn an old book into a journal where I can answer questions about my life, hopes, dreams, memories, and goals. Basically, a way to record all the stories and thoughts that I want my children to know. I’m hoping to create several books—enough to answer all the questions I love that Angel has in the Journaling Junkies section. I realized that there was so much that I want my girls to know and that I’ll never get to answering those questions if I leave them until I can make them scrapbook pages. This way, I still get to be creative while writing about my lie. I also plan to make a book (or several) to ask my daughters questions about their favorite memories. Actually, it occurred to me that it would be a nice idea to give an idea jar with different questions as well as an altered composition book to my siblings so they could record their memories as well. Of course, the big question is, will they? I hope so.

I had the most wonderful weekend! Juan and I went to see Wicked at the new Carnival Center for the Performing Arts. That had been my Christmas present this past year and I had been looking forward to seeing it for 3 months. We were so excited to have a night out without the girls, just the two of us. God knows, they’re few and far between! We got all dressed up and left the girls with Papi. The only problem was that there was a Heat game the same night and we got stuck in the most horrific traffic jam, 15 blocks away from the theater. It took us an hour and a half to go those 15 blocks, so we got to the theater 45 minutes late. We were so upset. We missed half of the first half and had to stand in the back until intermission. The show was so wonderful, though, that it made up for our being so late. Absolutely loved it! Both leads had the most amazing voices, and the songs were wonderful. I’ve been singing (God help everyone!) the songs from the show all weekend. I got the soundtrack today and have been listening to it non-stop!

Just saw this in Ali Edwards' blog. Beautiful.

"There is an article today in The Oregonian by columnist Margie Boule talking about the 20 years of journals at the Sylvia Beach Hotel in Newport, Oregon (a wonderful coastal town)....The article today all about the words people have left in the journals that are placed in each room over the last 20 years. All kinds of things. Life things. Good and bad things. Private things and silly things.

At the end of the article was the following quote left in one of the journals by a visitor:

'It's been so long since I picked up a pen and wrote more than everyday necessities: a grocery list or a phone number. But something about this place, authors alive and breathing within its walls, reminds me that I am writing because I must, because it is how I am supposed to experience the world. And if my words never glimmer longer than a moment, it doesn't matter. Because in that moment I am living and my words are lighting my jouney.'"

What a beautiful idea!

Just saw this in Ali Edwards' blog. Beautiful.

"There is an article today in The Oregonian by columnist Margie Boule talking about the 20 years of journals at the Sylvia Beach Hotel in Newport, Oregon (a wonderful coastal town)....The article today all about the words people have left in the journals that are placed in each room over the last 20 years. All kinds of things. Life things. Good and bad things. Private things and silly things.

At the end of the article was the following quote left in one of the journals by a visitor:

'It's been so long since I picked up a pen and wrote more than everyday necessities: a grocery list or a phone number. But something about this place, authors alive and breathing within its walls, reminds me that I am writing because I must, because it is how I am supposed to experience the world. And if my words never glimmer longer than a moment, it doesn't matter. Because in that moment I am living and my words are lighting my jouney.'"

What a beautiful idea!

It was a pretty calm, quiet day today. Susy is better, thank God. Went to Michaels--ostensibly to get a wood box to make a memory box for Ofelia, but also to check out the clearanced patterned paper and hopefully find some of the acrylic stamps that are supposedly in the dollar bins (yeah, Chatterbox for the former, but no dice on the stamps). In my defense, I wasn't really shopping for myself. I thought I'd introduce Mami to Chatterbox papers. She loved them! She's been scrapbooking so much lately, but I've been trying to get her to try some new things--mixing patterned papers, inking, stamping, painting, using flowers and brads...I've been giving her some of my older magazines so that she can look through them for ideas and inspiration, but shse hadn't been using them yet.

Yesterday, she told me that she wanted to start experimenting a little, so I got all excited. I happened to have the April issue of CK and we started going through it, pointing out different ideas that she could use. She mentioned that she wasn't using ribbon on her layouts because she needed to buy some. I told her not to worry, that I'd give her some ribbon.

This is where the confession comes in.

After I got home from work, I sat in front of the TV (watching Poker, hee, hee) and started going through my spools of ribbon. Depending on how much of each ribbon I had, I cut out anywhere between 1/2 a yard to 2 yards. I knew I had 4 photo boxes full of ribbon spools (once they're small lengths, I put them in embroidery floss boxes), but I don't think I really understood just how much ribbon I own.

Oh...my...God.

I separated almost 100 different ribbon lengths on clothespins for my mother. I never even opened the floss boxes, but I know there have to be at least 100 more different ribbons in them. I gave Mami a tin bucket filled with the ribbon clothespins, a stack of Chatterbox, some chipboard that I diecut for her, and some flowers for her pages. She was very excited, and I love to share.

But I'm still stunned by the ribbon.

So what did I do when I went to Michaels? I bought 2 more spools!

Obsessed? Not at all. :)

It's amazing how much time I've spent trying to set all this up. There are so many other links I want to add, but I thought I'd update.

Today I had planned to go to the park with the girls, meeting Mami and Richie, and most likely Helena, Veronica and Nicole, but I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of major raining. Finally, we got some rain! We've been so dry here that water restrictions were supposed to begin today. Instead, I took the girls to Richie's house where they all had fun playing together.

Poor Susy is sick, though. She had major stomach issues this morning--both ends. Had to give her an immediate bath and remove the seat from the exersaucer (God only knows how I'm going to get that thing back on!). She's had nothing but applesauce, bananas, gatorade, water, juice and bread today, poor baby. I hope she starts to feel better tomorrow, otherwise, I see a doctor's visit in the afternoon.

I thought I'd step into the world of blogging. I spend so much of my time online--mainly at scrapbooking sites and other blogs, that I thought I'd join in the fun. I'm hoping to use this as a journal of sorts, reminding myself to take stock of my life and record it. Of course, scrapbooking is a perfect medium for that and I hope to share my love of scrapbooking with all of you as well. So here's to recording this life I love.