Life Changes

I have had all my family members home for the summer.  My husband is a high school teacher who also works part time at a local college.  He has been home this summer except for when he is teaching his college class.  My oldest kid is home this summer too.  While working and volunteering took up most of her time, she was still living at home and I got to see her a lot.  All of my other kids were also living at home.  My second kid spent a lot of time working too, but I got to see her all the time.

Now though life is changing.  My second oldest went off for her first year of college.  Moving her in and saying good bye was hard.  I will miss her even though she is only an hour away from home.  My husband went back to his day job now too, so I don't get to spend as much time with him either.  I enjoy the time that we have during the summer because I don't get to see him a lot during the school year.  He is always busy with two jobs and a lot of grading and prepping for classes too.  My oldest goes back to her college at the end of the week.  I won't get to see her until Thanksgiving.  Her college is too far away for her to come home easily for the weekend.  I know that she will be busy with classes and studying and friends anyway.  I also have two school age children that go back to school next week.  I won't have them around during the day either and the after school activities also start up soon also, so they will be busy in the evenings.

I will be at home with my little one during the day.  It is always a bit of an adjustment from having everyone around all the time, to it just being the two of us.  I adjust a bit faster than my little one though.  He goes from having a lot of people to play with to being just with mommy.   I am hoping that having less people around during the day will translate to less chaos and being able to get more accomplished.  I have to balance my working time and my mom time however.  I know that too soon he will also go away to school and I will miss our time together.  I don't want to waste these years by not doing enough with him.

I do want to focus the my time part of my day to creating.  I create all the time anyway because I just don't feel complete if I don't, but now I will have a few less distractions.  I do have some big plans and things that I want to prepare for too.  I'm looking forward to cooler weather and a time of focused work, so that I can get some of my projects done and ready to share with the world.  So with that I will leave you to a creative and productive week.
Janelle      

Journal Pages

I haven't gotten a lot of art done this week. I have been sick with a bad summer cold and I have been focused on getting my girls ready to go off to college. Starting in the beginning of September I should be able to get back on track with my art.  School starts then for two of my boys and my girls will be off at their colleges.  I will be at home with my youngest again and will have a bit more quiet.  Having three boys at home all summer really adds to the chaos of my life.  It is somewhat easier to keep one occupied than to have to deal with all of them all day. I did have time to get a couple of pages done though this week.  I will share them and hopefully soon I'll have more to share.  

This page was inspired by Donna Downey's last Inspiration Wednesday. Check out her Youtube channel for some great journal pages.

This is my latest Lifebook page. It was a lesson by the talented Tamara Laporte.

I hope that everyone has a great weekend and can spend a bit of time being creative in your own way.
Janelle

Weekend Trip

I went on a long weekend trip this last weekend with my family.  I made three journal pages from my visit that I'll share with you.  It was a quick vacation, but a fun trip anyway.  

Ode to the Lake

I have still been working on a lot of other projects that aren't ready to share yet.  I'm also pretty busy getting ready to take my daughter's to college and my son's to school.  I'm spending a lot of time with my family enjoying the last few weeks of their summer vacation.  Next month I should be able to blog a bit more and have more projects finished and ready to share.  Have a good weekend.
Janelle

Ramblings and Art

I found time this week to make some more journal pages for me and for Lifebook.  I'm glad that I am catching up on lessons that I didn't get completed earlier in the year.  I love Lifebook because there is always something new to learn and so many amazing teachers to learn from.  I have also been working on many other projects that are in various stages of completion.  I will be able to share those later after they are done.
I have been spending time this month helping my daughter get ready to go to college this fall for the first time.  She is going into vocal music, so I'm not the only artist in the family.  I have also been soaking up all the minutes that I get to spend with my oldest daughter before she goes back to college.  I'm sure that I will have some journal pages later this fall that address my missing my girls.  I will only have boys at home this fall.  It has been many years that my husband and I have had at least one of our girls at home, but I guess that you have to let them leave the nest at some point.  Now onto the art.  

Have a great week,
Janelle

New Journal Pages

I have been working on a lot of projects this week that I will show off when they are more complete, but I do have some fun stuff in the works.  This fall is going to be a busy time for me as I get ready to do some craft shows later on.  I do however have some new journal pages to show off.   I hope that you enjoy seeing them.

Have a great weekend and I'll have more art to show later.
Janelle