These are the tulle ones that I just figured out how to make. Tulle is a little hard to work with but it is oh so pretty.

My hoarded fabrics from curtains, shirts and dresses has come in handy finally.

Sorry for the blurry pic.  I added pearls to the center of this batch to dress them up a bit.

These are tulle puffy barrettes….I will come up with a better name.  These are the first 3 prototypes and they were really fun to make.  I love the colors. Makes me feel like having a party.

Well, that is my barrette post for the day.

I hope all is well in your world.

~Katie

I love, love, love the little mason jar albums by Maya Road.  So cute.  I used Mason Jars, Pears and Strawberries in this album. I mixed it up a bit.

I used lots of scraps and odds and ends of stickers and embellishments. I have a zero budget for scrapping so I guess it is a good thing I did design work for so long, I have lots to work with.

I think this album reminds me of a bunch of vintage tea towels or something.  Anyhow, just wanted to share.  :)

~Katie

These are gift card holders made from Maya Road envelopes…….I could just make these and make these….and it feels so good to not only be creating again but also using up lots of scraps and odds and ends of supplies…..lots of little left overs from the years that are waiting to be used up.  These gift card holders are perfect for all the little pieces and parts I have stashed.

I had originally made a gift card holder for Maddy’s teacher last year.  We do a lot of gift cards for presents because in our town we only have a K-Mart to shop at so……..gift cards it is…but they just look so blah and impersonal.  So, I created a little something to jazz it up and make it look more special.

I am NOT a card maker and struggle like crazy making them but I have no problem with making envelopes.

Hope this day finds you all well and happy!

~Katie

I have started a trauma group recently.  It is going to be very good for me.  It is 10 weeks long and I have already bonded with some of the other women.  We are all survivors of one trauma or another.  Many of us multiple.  I have shared many of my traumas here on my blog.  I wear my heart on my sleeve, that is for sure. We are all at different stages of recovery and grief and it is SO nice to have this group of supportive women to be with to not only get support from but to help.  There is one in particular that is tugging at my heart a bit, as I see myself in her.  She is in that same place I was in about 6 months ago.  I am reaching out to her to let her know she will be o.k. and that she just has to remember that she is good and all will be well in the end.  That is what got me through and is getting me through still.

I know this post should be about my Dad but it really for me it is more about moving on.  Moving forward.  Remembering the lessons he taught me and  carrying his love in my heart.  Making him proud and being the woman that I was born to be.  These are my moving forward goals.  The divorce is not over yet, it’s very messy.  But I am moving forward in my life.  I could not wait for it to be over to move forward.  I do have days where things knock me to my knees  but for the most part i try to live for the good things and just block out the negative and the bad. I find my inner sunshine and try super hard to filter out the icky stuff that comes my way.

I am learning who I am now.  It is interesting, finding out who Katie is.  I tried to live for everyone else, be who they wanted me to be.  Get their approval.  I spun in circles for approval.  Not anymore.  I am taking care of me now.  I am learning to set boundaries. I am developing normal relationships.  It feels good.  I am scared of what the future holds but it is so much better then what my future did hold.  Now I have possibility.  Now I have choices and the ones I make are different then the ones I would have made before.  Now I can be ME.  I like me.  And guess what?  It is o.k. to like yourself.  But first you gotta know yourself to like yourself.  I have been getting to know myself this last year.

I think my Dad knew who I was and who I was gonna be. (this BLOG post gives me chills still and I am so thankful I have it)  I think he knew exactly where i was headed.  My Dad told my mom that he wasn’t sure which would last longer, his dog or my marriage.  His dog is still living.

I will never forget this year, ever.  It has literally been the worst year of my life.  The worst.  I will remember this year as my year of heartbreak, of loss, of sorrow but I will also remember this year as a year of growth, new beginnings and the beginning of taking myself back.  A very complicated year. One I would not relive for anything.  This officially ranks as the year I would not repeat for any amount of money. There isn’t even a close second. Nothing like being kicked while you are down.

I have worked hard this year.  I have self reflected like crazy.  Read a million self help books and googled help on even more subjects.  All baby steps that have helped me to get through the darkness of losing Dad and going through a contentious divorce.  I know who my true friends are and I appreciate them in a way that I have never appreciated friendship before.  I have a boyfriend, who is a kind, sweet man.  It is so very refreshing to be exactly me and be accepted for me.  It is a very nice change.

I do not make choices out of fear anymore.  I make choices that make my life, and my children’s lives better.  If I make a wrong choice, so be it.  It’s gonna happen.  I am human and not perfect.  So because I accept this about myself, I am not afraid to live anymore.  Everything I have done or not even done has been used against me in court and for a while I was terrified to move.  But then I realized that I could not live that way.  So I live.  I move forward.  I am a human.  I cannot tell you the calm this helped bring into my life.  There are moments and even days…..but for the most part I feel at peace.  When I start to stray away from that peace, I slow down and reign myself back into it.

What a difference a year makes.  Today has turned out  to be less about missing Dad and more about realizing how far I have come and how much I have been through.  After all, every day I miss Dad.  What difference does it make if it is the 364th day of missing him or a year and a day?  I still miss him.  So his year anniversary is filled with thoughts of me and my life but he is heavy in spirit with me today. I feel him very strongly and am immersed with memories.  I can still feel his hands in mine.

But today makes it official.  I have grieved for one year.  It is time to take off the black and start living intentionally and fully.

I am ready.

~Katie

p.s. I am in the process of turning my little dinette area into a scrap area.  I am having a very hard time fitting my family and art supplies in such a tiny new place.  So I am having to be creative with the spacing. So some creating has started.  This old book is soon to be a binder full of bits.  I will post photos of it when it is done.

I picked this part of the vintage measuring tape because the “F8″ says “Fate” to me.

I started college again.  I am a social work major.  I have 9 more classes and then I can transfer to SDSU. I luckily did not lose any of my credits from last time I was in school, which was a long while ago…..another life time ago.

My place is coming along….slowly..the move about killed me. But I am getting back into the swing of things.

A typical Friday night at my place on the weekends I have the girls.  Dog, activities, laptops, music, whir of activity or the background noise of people being happy.

This number pops up everywhere still….my Dad remains all around me.  I feel his presence and get little signs all the time from him. I remain close to someone he was close to and this helps me stay strong.  I talk to him all the time, it keeps me calm.  I know he hears me.  Miss him so much and had to learn the hard way, that I am not ready to drink wine on a night that I miss him.  Yikes.

Here is to a better year.  This last year was the hardest of my whole life.  I am out the other side now though and will keep working hard to move as far away from this last year as I can.  I only want to carry the lessons forward with me and none of the negative energy.  I need to let all of that stay right where it belongs and that is in the past.

I do not know what my future holds, I am essentially holding my breathe and keeping faith that I am headed the way I am supposed to be going.  It feels right.  Some pieces are still missing that I need to figure out but I have to let them work themselves back into my life. ahem…art.  It’s coming back…slowly.  I feel it.  Art will be different now for me though.  It played a vital role in my personal survival prior to my new life and it still may do that; but it will be different now.  I just don’t know how different.  I have to let it come on it’s own.  It will.  It always does.

Much love to all of you.  I get random support emails from you guys and they really mean the world to me.  I went through some dark as mud days and they sure did lift me up.  Thank you for not quitting on me.

~Katie

 

 

Hair in a ponytail, don't worry...i didn't cut it.

This quote is from a handout at my therapists office.  It is adapted from the Serenity prayer.

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know that it is ME.

It helped to change my life.

~Katie

Just some more music that I like. I really did not think i was a music person, but I don’t think I was in a place ever before in my life to listen to the messages or let the music into my heart…..now I cannot get enough of music. I used to listen to only talk radio in the car but now I am filling my head with songs and music. It is wonderful. The light at the end of the tunnel shines brightly for me now.

~Katie

~Dad, we did it! Cory got approved for SSI today. A 16 month fight but we didn’t quit just like I told you in the hospital we wouldn’t.

~Off to Urgent Care, looks like Maddy broke a finger playing football at recess yesterday……..Gotta love that girl!

~5th grade homework, I don’t like you!

~We are Montana bound for the 4th of July!! Got tickets, lodging and a rental car booked. Whitefish Lake, here we come!

~Catching up is SO exhausting.

~Went to Dad’s and got some of his Navy Memorabilia from the garage. Very hard to go through the boxes of his life.

~I wish one day that someone would surprise me and call and say, “I’ll bring the kids home from school today!”. Just saying. Get sick of the same routine 2x a day!

Yes, Maddy DID break her finger.  It’s the ring finger on her right hand.  Writing should be fun this week.

O.K. so, I am doing much better then I was but have lots of moments.  I really miss my Dad.  His service was beautiful and touching.  It brought some closure for all of us.

I have been working hard on getting our home organized and getting things caught up.  I am not the best multi-tasker lately.  I have to either focus on home or crafty stuff and I can’t seem to mix the two lately.

I can’t flit back and forth between the two all day like I used to.  I have to have a solid chunk of quiet time set aside for crafting or I am no good at all with creating.  I suppose it goes with the territory of everything right now. However, I have gotten my creating bug back just not my full energy yet.

So, when I can’t seem to carve out the quiet time to craft, I have been slowly organizing the crafting area.  Kind of mixing the two, I suppose.

I found this cool wire rack at an antique store in town.

For now I have the wire rack next to my chair at my scrapbooking table but am on the hunt for something to put it on but not have it too obtrusive to sit  next to me at my scrapping table.  Right now this is kind of my go-backs and put aways but I tend to like to leave them hanging around and try to work my way through them.  They stir my creative pot.

I did  the Maya Road Design Team Blog Post for today.  You can check out more pictures and info on the Maya Road Design Team Blog.

I’ll post some more projects soon!

~Katie

I used spray black primer and then spray black chalkboard paint.  You must prime the painted surface with chalk to prepare it for writing. It will pick up any etching in the surface, but don’t worry…it will not be noticeable once you erase your primed surface.

Like magic, I have a customizable Scrapbook Embellishment and Mini Album Storage Rack for my Scrapbook Room.  Sighhhhh…I love easy.

I have not hung this yet…..I need my husband to do it for me as I need it to be hung on studs so that if I load it FULL of product it won’t fall off the wall due to the weight..so I will wait for my stud to hang it for me.  I couldn’t wait to share the project with you though, so i’ll update later with pictures of it hanging.  I also need to move a few pieces around in my room to make room for this and I need Derek’s help to move everything.  More “honey do” lists for him.

Sorry my pics are so awful and skewed.  But you get the picture.  This type of storage works well for me because I am such a visual person, so I need to be able to see what I have to work with, getting stuff up and out of drawers and bins makes me use way more of my stash.  If I can see it, I use it.  Sometimes I sit at my table and just scan my walls to see what inspires me or matches what I am working on.  I will be on the hunt for more metal wall fixtures for sure!

Thanks for letting me share my storage project!

~Katie

Now, I have been asked to become one of the Garden Girls which means I have become a member of their very talented Design Team.   You have no idea how exciting that is to me!

Still can’t believe it.  I have known for a while, but Dad was too sick to take on anything new…..so they patiently waited for me.  Now it is official though and I can shout it out to anyone who will listen.

Just wanted to share my good news. I’m still learning the ropes but will be posting Garden projects now!

My first project is posted HERE.  You can see the cover up above.

~Katie