Sunday, August 26, 2007

Reuse- Orbit business card holder

OMSH introduced me to Orbit gum in a swap. I was getting ready to go to a conference and in getting my volunteer business cards together I realized the box is the perfect size for a business card holder.

From this:


To this:



Or this:



All you need is glue (I used mod podge), and paper. On the brown one I used tissue paper, and I love that you can see the orange of the Orbit box through it. On the second one I used scrapbooking paper.

Try Day: Beach Collage

See some more collages here

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I was featured reader on mamazine.com today. If you haven't read mamazine before, check it out!

Friday, August 24, 2007

Quest

When I saw the theme at Mama Says Om, I first thought of those delicious moments overhearing the kids plan some great adventure. Then I thought of my own quests.



Quest for Inner Peace. I've been seeking this for some time now--my holy grail. It is a three steps forward, two steps back kind of journey. This week has had advances and setbacks galore.



My next quest is for peace in parenting. This quest is closely linked to the quest for inner peace. I wonder if you can have one without the other, or if one must come before the other by necessity.



The quest for time for creativity suffers at the hand of the other two. The projects and ideas pile up, and whirl around my head. I know what I need to do to have peace in parenting, but often my desperate grasping after time for creativity causes me to lose my tentative grasp. But if I don't get to express myself, will I ever achieve inner peace?

Monday, August 20, 2007

More Love





My sister's husband is from Uzbekistan. His sister and her two children came to the US to visit my sister and her son (her husband is working out of the country right now). Sam and Halima had exchanged a few letters as pen pals, with my sister translating. And when my sister and her husband lived across the street from them in Tashkent, Halima and Muhammed got to know my kids via pictures and movies. When my sister visited us she'd bring pictures and movies of them. So, when we knew that Halima and Muhammed were coming to visit, we knew we had to get up to see them somehow. We squeezed in a visit last weekend.

We had a wonderful time. Although it was their first time meeting, the kids felt like they already knew each other. It was so cool seeing them figure out how to communicate even though we don't speak Karakalpak and they don't speak much English.

In other highlights Sam was thrilled to finally see an R2-D2 mailbox!

Love



My sister-in-law took this gorgeous photo of Maya and her son, Tedi. We are all so blessed that he has joined our family! He's such a sweet guy; it has been so much fun to watch/listen to him learn English.

Friday, August 03, 2007

Fun





















For more fun photographs visit Create a Connection!

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

I did it!!!


I feel like Dora the Explorer, I'm going around singing "I did it. I did it! I did it. Yeah!"

Oh, what did I do? On Monday I took the lactation consultant board certification exam. I won't get results till October, but I feel that I did really well. I was excited and smiling even as working on the exam. When I got home my family had a little party for me :)

I've had so many things I've wanted to write about the past few weeks but was spending my time studying and attending a breastfeeding/parenting conference. The conference was wonderful and I heard some amazing speakers like Dr. James McKenna, Dr. Nils Bergman, Ina May Gaskin, Dr. Peter Hartmann, and Dr. Miriam Labbok. Everything I heard reinforced my studying and left me feeling great.

There are just a few weeks left before school begins again here in Florida. We'll be spending quite a bit of time with family. I'm looking forward to catching up on some things at home and settling down to do some sewing and other craft projects.