disjointed mutterings

aaaagghhh! the power flicked off while I was doing this entry, so this is take two!

My kids - bless 'em - have discovered the effects of playing a 33rpm record at 45 rpm (yes, I'm talking old vinyl here). Most of yesterday afternoon I was treated to Bing Crosby on amphetamines! You've never really enjoyed White Christmas or Jingle Bells with the Andrews sisters, until they've been chipmunked!

My Dover order finally arrived yesterday. In the past, via airmail, book orders from there have taken about 10 days. FedEx took four weeks, and even then, the courier phoned me and asked me where in town he could leave it for me to pick up, as he couldn't be bothered driving out of town to find me. And the Christmas clipart book/cd is missing from the order too! I've sent an email to Dover's customer service, so will just have to wait to hear back from them.

We finally managed to get the livingroom sorted and cleaned, and put the Christmas tree up yesterday. As soon as it was pushed back into the corner, lights plugged in and turned on, Isaiah turned to me, and asked hopefully, "Presents?" They are all getting sooooo excited. Just a shame the tree looks so tacky, but they love it. I got a few photos of some of them in front of the tree, will post them, or make layouts soon.

I took a cd of photos in to get processed - took hours to crop them to 6x4 (why can't digital cameras take the standard size pic?). I didn't realise it had been so long since I got the last batch done - there were 270 files, and that only took me to the end of September! eeek! But doing them like this, they go off to Kodak for only 15c per print, and the quality is excellent, of course. And yes, I still get them processed like this to paper scrap.

The bloke came to mow the hay late yesterday. We only locked up a small paddock, there is still quite a bit of hay still in the shed, so this is just a top-up. A bit disappointed that it didn't cut as well as we thought, it's a bit thin. But it will be good to go into another year with an excess, rather than the desperate shortages of the past couple of years.

I scrapped again, a simple, white-space layout popped into my head late yesterday, and just had to be scrapped. I love this photo, even though my camera, on auto settings, managed to drastically over-expose it at the time. It just captures Grace so naturally, she often gets a bit tight and self-conscious when we line up for photos. So thank goodness for Virtual Photographer. I tweaked and fiddled until I was happy with it (don't ask, I've got no idea how I got there) - here's before and after so you can see what I'm talking about:



Here's the layout, another with Sandra's A Stroll in the Park kit (will be at the DigiChick boutique soon), and I used the Atomic Cupcake inked edged action for PSE3 (at least I use that program for something). I like it, and have gotten lots of lovely comments in the galleries where I have posted it. Maybe my slump is almost over. I just have to be true to my own style, I guess (simple simple simple)



So, I'm feeling like scrapping, which is good. I'll have to see what today brings. Got lots to do, loads of dirty washing, and scrapbooking night in town tonight, our last before Christmas, so will put together some goodies for the ladies too, and make something nice for supper. (I still haven't done those darned Christmas cakes - the fruit is still soaking in booze in the fridge!)