A little of this, a little of that....

Strawberries, a Water Table and Ash Cave...

Well, well, well... look at me. I'm blogging again. Has it really been two months since my last post!? 

Thought I'd start things up again by posting about our super busy and super fun day we had yesterday.

We started off by going to pick our own strawberries!

We thought Finley would like it because she's been eating her weight in strawberries lately. 

Riding on the tractor back to the strawberry fields...

Since the strawberries weren't cut up and on her highchair tray, Jim had to show her a strawberry to get her going.

She caught on pretty fast...

Jim and I would take turns picking and then watching our little strawberry monster. By the time we'd find a good strawberry and pick off the stem for her, she'd grab any strawberry she could find and eat it- stem and all. Sometimes rotten parts and all. Sometimes stem, rotten parts and bugs and all. 

She was our official taste tester! We gave her her own little quart container, but as soon as we'd put a strawberry in it, she'd eat it. 

Jim and Finley with Jim Doran (Finley's face is COVERED in strawberries!). 

We ended up picking a little over seven pounds of strawberries. Those seven pounds were a lot of work- trying to wrangle our strawberry monster all the while picking the berries. We chose to pick the tiny, super sweet Early Glow berries. They're the kind most used to make jams because they're so sweet. But they're so TINY. Most are about the size of your thumb tip. It took A LOT of picking to get seven pounds of these little gems! By the time we were done, I was sweating and had sweat running in my eyes. I definitely could never make it as a professional strawberry picker. 

Our work paid off though- the berries are so good! Super sweet! It's amazing how different home-grown strawberries taste versus the ones from Meijer. 

Once we changed Finley, we headed down to Lancaster. Finley was going to spend the afternoon with her Grandma and Granny.

We took her new Water Table down since it was so sunny and warm yesterday. 

She LOVED it!

Finley stayed with her Grandma and Granny and Jim and I headed down to Hocking Hills. We went to Ash Cave for some easy hiking.

It was a great afternoon! Although whenever we got out of the car, I kept waiting for Jim to get Finley out of her carseat. It was so unusual for the two of us to be somewhere without her! 

After Ash Cave, we drove through the State Park campground to jealously look at the people camping. We haven't been camping in a couple of years and miss going. We then reminisced about some of our memorable camping trips. Like the weekend at Kelley's Island with the snakes and the crazy I-think-our-tent-is-going-to-blow-away wind storm. And then the camping trip at Hocking Hills when it was in the 40's at night!  We definitely have had some memorable trips.

We headed back to Lancaster and Mom and Granny had a cook-out for dinner. Finley was still having fun playing with the Water Table and looked at us like "Oh, you've been gone?". I guess it was good she was having so much fun she didn't even have time to miss us! 

A busy day, but a great day. 

Scrapbooking layouts...

Good news- we're all feeling better than yesterday! Finley drank two sippies of milk this morning, plus yogurt, toast and cheese. She still wants to be held a lot, so I think she still feels a little under the weather. 

I wanted to keep up with posting scrapbooking layouts. Here are some from the end of December and January:

I felt silly for dragging Finley out in the snow that barely covered the grass, but now I'm glad I did. Glad I didn't wait for a bigger snowfall!

I didn't use any We R Memory Keepers divided page protectors- I scrapped it up old school and just made 12x12 layouts.

Also, if you haven't already figured it out, I use a lot of these American Crafts Thickers alphabet stickers (Daiquiri Black and Green)

Here's to another day of getting better and lounging around! 

 

Sick.

A stomach/intestinal bug has made it's way through every (human) member of the Taylor house.

Jim and I earned yet another '1st time parent' badge recently. Finley threw up all over both of us (at different times). I also earned yet another badge today, when she had a massive blowout and it soaked through her diaper, her pants and on to my pants. OMG. I wasn't quite ready for that. It took both Jim and I to clean up the mess. I did not handle this well. Poor Jim, he's such a trooper. 

Having a sick child is horrible. Especially when she can't talk yet and the only way she has to communicate that she doesn't feel well is to constantly whine/half-cry. And all she wants to do is have her mama hold her, even when her mama herself is sick. Even when all her mama wants to do is lie on the couch and whine/half-cry as well. 

I'm feeling somewhat better, but still sore and achy. Jim and Finley are also doing better, but one is still running to the bathroom for massive blowouts and the other one is filling her diaper with massive blowouts. Sorry if that's TMI.

Jim and I have watched countless hours of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Little Einsteins over the past 48 hours because that's all Finley wanted to do while she was slumped up against me on the couch. 

I did muster enough energy today to go pick up a Panera order. I got in the car, drove to Panera, walked my "I-look-like-death-warmed-over" self into Panera, drove home, only to find those malicious workers forgot my bagel and cream cheese. Normally this wouldn't have been a big deal, but considering what I've been through the past two days, I thought my world was ending.

There's been some silver linings in this situation: 1) I discovered the 'Sanitary' setting on my washing machine works like a champ. 2) Other than laundry, the only other productive thing I've done is become obsessed playing with 'Draw Something' and 'Scramble With Friends' on my phone. Normally this wouldn't be a silver lining, but I have quickly managed to rack up the coins on 'Draw Something' so I can buy additional colors. 3) Jim and I think someone would make a goldmine if they offered a local delivery service (i.e... going and picking up a bagel that was left off of a to-go order). 

Here's to a better tomorrow! :)

Cake faces.

Since I just finished scrapbooking Finley's 1st birthday party, I thought I'd take a trip down memory lane and look back on some previous first birthday parties...

Olivia's 1st Birthday (2004):

Henry's 1st Birthday (2010):

Claire's 1st Birthday (2008):

Averie's 1st Birthday (2008):

Troy's 1st Birthday (2011):

Cute little cake smashers!

 

Alphabet Sampler

I recently made this alphabet sampler for my friend's little girl.

It was in a 11x14 shadowbox, but I had to take it out of the shadowbox to take a photo of it, or else the glare would have been too much.

I used foam squares on selected letters to give some dimension. I also didn't want every letter to have an iconic shape, just certain ones. My favorite was the yarn wrapped around the 'Y'.  :)

Finley's 1st Year Scrapbook (Volume 4)

The fourth album is from November through Christmas. Technically, her first year album would end after her birthday, but I included Christmas. It kind of felt like this Christmas was her first Christmas (since she was only 24 hours old last Christmas!).

Here's a sampling from the fourth book:

Starting off with 6x6 4-up pages:

Using the 4x4 9-up page protectors:

I didn't have enough vertical photos to fill all pockets, so I used my paper trimmer and cut off 1/3 of the page protector to make a 4x6 4-up page (on the left in the photo below):

I had LOTS of photos from her birthday party. I used a lot of the 4x6 6-up and 6x4 6-up pages.

I added the birthday subway text (Leslie made this for Finley's party):

I saw this idea from Pinterest and added it to Finley's book. It's a birthday interview and I'm going to do one each year (Jim and I answered her questions for this year). 

Leslie also designed these birthday wish squares. I wanted everyone at the party to write a birthday message to Finley!

Finley's Christmas cards:

I took a lot of photos her first year, and I don't care that her first year is four albums. I've slowed down taking photos and am caught up on scrapbooking through the month of January (so I'm 1 1/2 months behind). 

And there you have it! Finley's 1st year scrapbook! :)

Finley's 1st Year Scrapbook (Volume 3)

Happy Monday morning! 

The third album is from mid-May through October. I have a correction: on the second book, I said it was from January through June. It was actually January through mid-May. Ooops!

Here's a sampling from the third book:

It starts with her monthly notables. Each month, I'd blog about her development and her likes/dislikes. It was then easy to just copy, paste and print!

Using the 4x6 4-up/3x3 3-up page protector:

I loved using the 6x6 4-up pages. It was easy to add in all those random photos I took on various days. 

In the photo above, on the right, you can see Jim's letter to Finley. Every now and then Jim will write a letter to Finley. I just print it off on cardstock and slip it in an 8 1/2 x 11 page protector.

I got into the habit of being consicous of HOW I was taking her photos. I tried to either keep shooting all vertical or all hortizontal, and then I wouldn't try to take more than six photos. If I did take more than six photos, I'd choose the best six and delete the rest. Some of the photos look SO similiar, but I love capturing all of her different faces and expressions.

Using the 6x4 3-up/6x12 page protector:

"Time for an afternoon swim"

I took this series of photos because Finley was making all kinds of faces one evening we were out. She was cracking us up.

In the photo below, you can see that I didn't always remember to take a decent photo of her on the 24th of each month. I didn't even get her 9 month photo reprinted as an 8x12. I didn't beat myself up too much- I knew I was still making an honest effort to have her first year well documented! :)

"Our little roughhouser". I took this batch of photos so we'd remember how Finley loved to play in the corner of the couch and root around in the pillows. She also loved to stand up and then fall backwards. We always said she was roughhousing! 

I realized I had already gotten an 8x12 reprint of the Pumpkin Fairy photo after I made this layout. Rather than re-doing it, I just cut the 8x12 down and added it to the album as a 6x12. I love having 6x12's, 8 1/2 x 11's and 12x12's all mixed in the same album. Here you can see three different sizes of page protectors.

I add all of her holiday cards, just so everything is all together and in one place.

So there's the third book! Stay tuned for the fourth! :)

Busy, busy.

The past couple of weeks have been very busy. More so than usual. Jim's been very busy working to resolve open ends from his brother's passing and has been trying to manage (juggling) lots of things on his plate.

We've still tried to keep up listing things on eBay and Craigslist. Jim's sold four items through Craigslist. He always does his Craigslist business at a local business, so don't worry- we don't have strangers coming to our house. I also sold our Wii system to a guy who drove an hour to meet to pay and pick it up. Jim, Finley and I all went together to sell the Wii. Turns out, the guy that bought it also brought his wife and infant. I felt good about the sale- the Wii went from one family to another family. I also tried twice to sell one of my camera lenses, but the guy ended up wasting two hours of my time. Annoying. We waited an hour the first time and left because he didn't show up and then the second time, he was a half hour late. He did finally show up and then once he saw the lens, he said "Oh, this is a manual focus lens?". Umm, yes, that's why it said MANUAL FOCUS in the item listing. Ugh! He then asked what other items I had for sale. Did I have a flash? I said yes, but I don't want to sell it. He then asked if I had DVD's for sale. ? What? I got the hell up out of there. Later, loser. 

Also in the past several weeks, I've shipped out 26 items that I've sold on eBay. Selling items on eBay is hard work. I went to the Post Office every day for about two weeks straight (this is a HUGE feat since Finley doesn't want to be in her stroller anymore and just wants to run rampid through the Post Office). I also lost money on several items, because I underestimated how much shipping would be. Oh, and don't get me started about the fees. There's an eBay fee. There's a PayPal fee. There's the shipping charge. And sometimes there's cost involved for packaging supplies. I keep a spreadsheet listing all of my costs involved so I can see what my profit is for each item (not taking into account the original cost of the item). After selling 26 items, I ended up only making 60% profit. :( I also had one item arrive broken, so to avoid getting a negative feedback, I refunded her money. So I lost $45 on that transaction (note to self: if the item could break in any possible way, it's worth it to get insurance).

If I keep selling things on eBay, I'm going to get a scale so I know exactly how much to charge for shipping and then set up a print-and-ship account with the Post Office so I don't have to go to the Post Office everyday (with a print-and-ship account, they'll pick up the packages at your house). I'm going to list more items on April 1st. EBay lets you list 50 auction-style items for free each month (free to list, but you still pay a fee if it sells) and I've already used my 50 free listing for March. So for this round, I'm bummed about the profit not being more, but there are some good things that came out of this round- we got rid of some stuff that was just taking up space, I learned some valuable lessons about selling on eBay, and we did end up with some extra money. 

In other news, I went to Pittsburgh last Thursday evening and stayed overnight with my buddy Lisa and her family. On Friday morning, Lisa and I went to the semi-annual SnuggleBugs sale! It was awesome! I posted about my last trip here. I'll post photos of my haul later. I got soooo many cute clothes for Finley! She's going to be A. DOR. A. BLE. this spring and summer! :)

On Saturday, Finley and I went to my cousin Sara's baby shower. Sara is Troy's mommy and now she's having a little girl (Lainey). Lainey is due April 18th. I took my camera, but I regretfully didn't take hardly any photos. I was chasing Finley around or holding her- she wanted nothing to do with anyone else holding her (including Mom or Granny). She's in a SUPER clingy stage right now. I had to feed her and also eat my lunch while she was sitting on my lap. She wanted nothing to do with sitting in her highchair, even though it was 4" away from me. 

I did manage to take a couple photos of Finley and Averie (Averie loves to be close to Finley).

I kept trying to get a good picture of Finley, but she kept giving me this look:

After we came home from the shower, we let her walk around in the front yard. The neighbor boy (Mason) had just zoomed down the sidewalk in his Jeep (she's starting to point at him):

I love this little dress of hers- it got horses on it and looks western. My grandpa would've loved this dress- it had those pearly snap buttons (he always wore shirts with those same kind of snap buttons!). She also has her new sandals. All ready for Spring! 

Better go, we're heading up to Jim's Mom & Dad's for lunch today and I hear little miss waking up from her nap!

 

Finley's 1st Year Scrapbook (Volume 2)

Finley's 2nd book is from January through mid-May.   

A sampling from the second book....

Again, using lots of the 6x6 4-up pages:

One of my favorite pages in her book:

Using the 6x8/4x6 horizontal 4-up page protectors:

"Precious jewel, you glow, you shine, reflecting all the good things in the world."

Using the 3-up 4x6 horizontal/2-up 4x6/2x12 vertical page protectors:

I also don't really like this style of page protector either- the 2x12 piece doesn't stay in very well. I use a couple of glue dots to hold it in place.

"Chatting with Granny"

Finley's 1st Year Scrapbook (Volume 1)

Well, I did it! I finished scrapbooking Finley's 1st year! I say '1st Year Scrapbook' in the singular sense, but it actually is four albums. 

I knew that I had to change how I scrapbooked in order to keep up. I started using the We R Memory Keepers divided pages to help get the photos into the albums in a faster way. Sometimes it's tricky to use these page protectors, as sometimes I'd be one photo short of filling the page, or have a vertical photo where a horizontal photo is supposed to go. 

I developed a system where on the first of every month, I'd organize my photos from the previous month, rename them using a date system, and then copy them from my SD card to three different places. I would then get that month's photos printed. To me, getting your photos printed, organized and ready to scrapbook is half of the battle. 

I used to use a lot of different sizes of photos. I'd get 4x6 prints made of all of my photos and then would use Page Maps to plan a layout and then get reprints made in different sizes, based on the layout I was creating. Shamelessly, I wasted A LOT of 4x6 photos. 

Nowadays, I try to just use the 4x6 photos. On the photos that I really like, I'll get a reprint made (usually an 8x12). I LOVE 8x12's. It's the exact ratio as the 4x6, so I don't have to worry about cropping the photo.

I also made myself accept the fact that each page I create cannot be an it-took-six-hours masterpiece. I love and appreciate those pages that are so artsy and creative, but to keep up with all of Finley's photos and to document the stories and our everyday life, I had to revert back to a simpler approach. I'm not crazy about every single layout that I created, but it's done. I guess if I end up having ample time on my hands years down the road, I can go back and re-do them (but I also guess that's not going to happen).

Also, I realized how much I loved Finley because all of that special KI Memories paper that I'd been saving for years for that "special page", I was using in her scrapbook. 

Finley's first album is from December 23rd (the day I went into the hospital) to December 31st.

I had a lot of text to add in the beginning of this album, so I had to find a creative way to add in the photos. All of the text was copied and pasted from this blog. At the time it seemed daunting to type out all of the details, but now I'm so glad I did. 

The first page and then a sampling of pages from the first book:

Using the Horizontal 6-up page protectors (I used A LOT of these along with the Verticual 6-up page protectors):

Using the 6x12; 4x6 3-up page protector:

Side note: I hate this style of page protector... when you turn the page, the 6x12 insert starts to slip out. I wish they would have put the opening at the top on the 6" side, versus down the middle.

I ordered this 12x12 page from Birthday Keepsakes. It has Finley's birth stats, plus other tidbits for December 24th and also for 2010. I started to google all of this info myself, but I quickly ran out of patience and realized it was worth the cost of $12.99.

I made this "Welcome to the world Finley" as an insert for a 12x12 shadowbox and had it ready when we brought Finley home. I made it about three months before she was born. We still didn't know if we were having a boy or a girl, but I just knew it a girl. :) (I'd told Jim I was also going to make one with the boy's name on it to have it ready, but I never did) After I took it out of the frame, I added it to her scrapbook.

I also used a lot of the 6x6 4-up page protectors for her book:

When I had text to add, I printed it on a 6x6 cardstock square and slipped it in along with the photos. Throughout all of her albums, I used the same two fonts to keep it consistent. 

I made a few dozen of the 'Favorite Photo' circle labels so I could quickly add them to my favorites. 

"Just hand over the bottle and no one gets hurt." She'd get so feisty when she was hungry!

Coming up: volume 2! :)