justem: little bits of this and that

#workspacewednesday

A quick note that I have a Workspace Wednesday post up on the October Afternoon blog today! This week we celebrated a year in our home, and the post looks back at the progress my scrap space has made in the last 365 days. I'd love for you to check out! :)  

STL {Fancy Pants}

Hello, hello! Pardon my lack of blogging lately. Mac is still off in Oregon where B.J. the superhero computer genius is working to get everything saved and working. Today I have a layout made for the Fancy Pants Social Media Team! This layout includes many fun products from the True Friend collection, which is fitting since this layout features photos of trip my good friend Cindy and I took to St. Louis!  

I love the look of little photos on a layout. I don't know I why I don't use it more often! (Beware...now I will go and make like six layouts with little photos, ha!) I don't have any close-ups of this one right now...maybe when Mac returns home I will add some. It's all pretty self-explanatory, though. ;)  I hope it was a good Tuesday!

The Super Spahns {October Afternoon Challenge Layout}

Hello, hello!  First - and update on trusty Mac.  He is being shipped off to my friend in Oregon where her husband (aka: my new favorite person) thinks he may be able to both fix him AND save my goodies.  I am keeping my fingers and toes and every other crossable appendages crossed.  Meanwhile, I'm trucking away with Geriatric Mac. She won't download my photos. She's too old to update any software, so everything I'm dealing with is from like 2011. And it took me (literally) 2.5 hours to write two design team blog posts last night because she is so freaking slow.  So yes, back to those crossed fingers...

Anywho...I had a layout up on the October Afternoon blog today.  I was in charge of picking the inspiration for Tuesday Inspiration, and I did so before the aforementioned tragedy. I had envisioned something else completely, but with no Silhouette, I had to shift gears.  Here's a look at my finished product. It's a litlte crazy, but we all know I kind of like crazy. ;) For a some more behind-the-scenes info, including the super fun original inspiration, be sure to check out the original post on the OA blog!  Hope it was a good day!

Gossamer Blue Inspiration Blog Hop {Play}

Hello, and welcome to our  second Gossamer Blue Inspiration Blog Hop! Have you noticed that in the world of kit clubs it's always go, go, go and often before you've even received your kit in the mail there are is already buzz about the next kit? It can be frustrating. We at Gossamer Blue want you to know that we feel your pain and are here with some November inspiration for those of you who are currently knee-deep into this month's kit! Today, I have a layout to share that I created using a mix of the main scrapbooking kit and the scrapbooking add-ons:

If you know me, you know I'm not a stamper. At all. But, this little plus stamp in the Life Pages kit was so perfect, I just had to use it! I stamped it all over and then stamped a few pluses on some of the coordinating patterned paper and then layered them onto my paper.  I will admit, I had a really hard time with a title for this page. I love the Crate Paper rub-on, but it just didn't feel right as a title, nor did it fit anywhere on my page in its original format, so I cut it apart and put it on the top right. Now I kind of regret that decision and wish I would have just left the layout as is. Oh well. I decided on on the short white title of Play after I added the rub-on. Oh well.  You win some, you lose some. ;) Overall, I love the fun bright colors of this Kelly Purkey Basic Grey line, and again...that stamp!!

To hop along with us, here is a list of all our participants this month!  Remember you can always reference the Gossamer Blue blog for a full list of participants! Have an inspiring day, and happy hopping!

Gossamer Blue Blog

Anabelle O'Malley

Beshka Kueser

Brenda Weaver

Cindy Liebel

Diane Payne

Emily Spahn **That's me!**

Erin Taylor **Go here next!**

Eunyoung Lee

Jill Cornell

Heather Leopard 

Jill Keller

Kasia Przbyt

Katie Ehmann

Keisha Campbell

Laura Crosby

Maria Lacuesta

Melanie Blackburn

Michelle Wooderson

Nicole Harper

Rebecca Luminarias

Sabrina Alery

Vanessa Perry

Five for Friday {night}:

1. My new favorite shirt is this one from Target. I have purchased the foxes and the teal arrows. I wish they had more patterned options (most are solid), because I would buy every one!  They are soft and warm and comfy!

2. I have to laugh when I Shazam a song on my phone, only to realize that I had already Shazamed (yes,that is totally a verb!) it before!  This is one that I have tagged at least twice already, ha!

3. Speaking of music, I randomly stayed up and watched Jimmy Fallon last night. I can't even tell you the last time that I saw his show when it wasn't a video after the fact. Um, maybe never. ;) Anyway, I basically live under a rock, and I had never heard of Echosmith or Cool Kids (have you?  maybe nobody has heard of them...), but...man, I was blown away by the stage presence of the 17 year old lead singer.  I could barely walk down the hall without tripping at 17. Oh wait, that's still true. Anyway, check it out.  It's a catchy little tune, and how fun that they are siblings. Note to self: start rehearsing with the Super Spahns... ;)

4. I am an egg nog junkie. I LOVE it. I have been a fan since I was a little kid. I was crazy excited to see egg nog at Target this week. I picked up two of the three Watkins flavors they carried: Vanilla Almond and Pumpkin Spice. The Pumpkin Spice was good, but the Vanilla Almond was kind of life-changing.  I am considering going back and buying up every single container...which would last me like a day or two. ;)  I realize this is full of sugar and fat and all kinds of junk...but hey - it's the holidays and it only comes out one month, er, two months a year!  

5. I am constantly embarrassed by "my country."  Why, you ask?  No this has NOTHING to do with elections!!! ;)  Well, I love using the "Explore" tab on Instagram. Most of the photos that show up in my Explore tab are beautiful photographs, cute kids, fun crafts, etc. However, every once in awhile some totally inappropriate photo of a scantily clad woman or something of like. Inevitably, every time I click on one of those (and really, why do I even do it?!) they are shown to me, because they are "popular in my country." UGH. Come on country. Have a little more class! ;)

And...because I somehow messed this up (let's blame the old replacement computer...ughhhh), I ended up with one extra fact...so here's six...for almost Saturday!

6. Have you seen the #crafttherainbow posts on Instagram?  They were started by a blogger/instagrammer I follow called The House that Lars Built. If you know me, you know I love rainbows, especially *things* in rainbow order! So this entire "project" was pretty much perfect for me!!  Check out some of the favorites on her blog. 

Be sure to stop back tomorrow for the Gossamer Blue Inspiration Blog Hop! I will be freezing my heiny off at a tailgate...where the high is slated to be 34 degrees! We are hard core! ;)  Have a great weekend!

the things you think won't happen...

Every other day for the last month I said to myself (and my husband) "I really need to back up my computer."  But I didn't do it. It takes so long. And I couldn't even remember where the cords to the external hard drive were.  And I would just do it next week. And now it's next week...and I'm the girl who didn't back up her computer and risks losing everything on it.  

Monday evening I was listening to Pandora, and a song I didn't like came on. When I went to fast forward the song, I realized my computer had locked up. I waited and tried what I could, but finally I ended up doing a hard shut down and restarting. When I restarted this menu came up:

I used my phone to make an appointment with the Apple Store for Tuesday afternoon. I trekked there with all three kids and high hopes for my computer. I wasn't worried. I figured the genius could just reinstall an operating system to my computer and we would be on our merry way. The big kids were awesome and played with the iPads while the genius (who was like some 20 year old kid) worked on my computer. He told me my hard drive was fine, which was a really good thing (score!).  However, when he tried ot reload the operating system, it wouldn't work...I don't know computer lingo, but it just woudn't work. In order for it to work they would need to wipe my computer clean, then reinstall it. Wait. WHAT. Wipe it clean????  We are taking like tens of thousands of photos. Now I'm irresponsible...but I'm not so irresponsible that I've never backed up my computer...I do have an external hard drive with a lot of info on it.  I just don't know when I last performed a backup.  It might have been six months ago. It might have been a year ago. A year. That means my son's entire first year would be gone. I did indeed cry in the middle of the Apple store. Poor 20 year old genius.

The genius said that a data recovery system would be definitely able to get my files (FYI, he tried to find them, but could not...it's not like he just jumped to the "wipe it clean" thing...I just don't know all the technicalities to explain them here...it was, however, the last resort.) but it would cost me at the absolute cheapest probably $800. I still need to figure out when my last backup was onto my external drive and decide what I'm going to do. I think I will probably take it in for an estimate.  We shall see. How do you put a price on the photos of your baby's first year??

For now, I've resurrected my like six-year old-laptop that we shelved when I got the last one. It's soooo slow and so old that the operating system won't support Google Chrome, and I can't for the life of me figure out how do basic tasks like how to highlight sections, which is why this isn't formatted like most of my posts. (I usually italicize things in parentheses. Yes, I know this is not the correct way to write, but it's my blog and I can do what I want to!) ;) I have so many layouts due and no photos and no way to die cut on my Cameo.  I'm jokingly told a friend today that I am in the "denial" stage of grief.  I'm so mad at myself.  I feel so stupid. I knew this could happen. I knew I needed to do a backup. I just didn't.  So...learn from my mistakes. Go backup your computer. Do it now. For me. For you.

Music Monday

If you've been following this blog for awhile, you know that my #1 favorite artist is Ingrid Michaleson. I had the awesome privilege of seeing her in concert for the fifth time on Friday evening at the Wisconsin Union Theater. We were in the third row on the aisle, so I could see everything incredibly well. I sound like a star-crazed teenager with a crush, but honestly...she's just so wonderful. I loved every minute of it. Even my husband commented on how happy I looked during the entire concert.  A couple of times last week, I used social media to mention to her that she really needed to eat cheese curds while in Madison...and that I had a few good suggestions for her. Of course I was really hoping she would decide I should be her personal cheese curd tour guide of Madison, but that didn't happen. (I'm sure my stalkerish tendencies had nothing to do with that!) However, she DID mention during the concert that she heard Madison had some great cheese curds, which I consider to be a little personal shout-out to me. ;)

(I did not take the above photo - I took a photo exactly like this, but mine was blurry.  So I stole this one from the internet - this is the same night and from a person who must have been sitting pretty near me!!)

She played a lot of good music, but the long I loved the most is my 2nd favorite Ingrid song of all time...in fact I've already shared it on this blog, but I will again, because it's so good. Ingrid's mom recently passed away, and I appreciated how honest she was about her pain. I have to wonder if this song (though written years before) is performed now as a tribute and a reminder of her loss. The song is haunting and beautiful - "One day you will go away from this.  One day you will know we're men of snow...we melt away." It doesn't sound quite as perfect when I type it out, so you should probably just listen. ;)

At the Time {Fancy Pants}

Happy Sunday! My weeks are flying by right now, which is not always a good thing! ;)  I have a Fancy Pants Social Media team layout to share today!  This layout has a Christmas feel to it, but it actually has nothing to do with Christmas.  This layout talks about a totally disastrous evening a couple of months ago. I like the idea of not always scrapping the best moments, but sometimes scrapping the not so great ones, too...and of course it always helps to look back at the tough times and laugh!!  I absolutely love this photo of my son as the sun is setting behind him, and I wanted the colors in the layout to reflect the photo, which is why I went with reds and greens. While the title and the little asterisks look stamped, I actually just used a black pen to trace them.  

 

Hope everyone is having a great weekend!  It's supposed to snow tomorrow...and not just a couple of flakes...a full fledged winter storm. Yahoo. That's sarcasm. ;)

Fall '14 {Gossamer Blue November}

Happy Monday! I had a busy weekend full of visitors, family and Halloween fun! Today I'm back with my first layout using the November Gossamer Blue kit! It's a super fun kit with great colors and fun products! My Main Kit only layout is a little crazy busy. The photo is a weird one to scrap, because you can't even really see my daughter behind all those leaves, but I still loved it and I wanted to include it on a layout. My favorite thing about this month's kits are the pops of yellow!  I used some yellow elements here to showcase the yellow leaves in the photo!

I am also loving all the black and white papers and embellishments lately - this kit is full of them!  I believe the main kit is now sold out, but definitely stop by Gossamer Blue to check out the work of my fabulous design team teammates!  Have a great day!!