O is for Outside

I finally made the O is for Outside page tonight! I really like how it came out:)

I had a REALLY hard day today. I did do some fun things, but by the time both were over, Emma was being difficult because it was either naptime or bedtime. I've been on a crazy emotional rollercoaster all day. Just lots of frustrating or stressful things going on. And the fact that 4shared was saying I had 0 downloads of yesterday's template was pretty depressing. I was already having self esteem issues and that didn't help. I found out later that for some reason 4shared wasn't recording the downloads. So now I have no idea how many I got! It's currently saying there were 9, but I know there were more than that, based on the comments I got here and on 4shared, and the fact that Kimi said she downloaded it but that it was not registering the download in the numbers. Weird.

We had enrichment today. It was purse themed, and we had a lesson, some yummy food, played a couple purse related games, and made cute little purses out of fabric placemats and ribbon. But the ribbon was...well...cheap (no offence to my enrichment committee girls who read this!). It frayed past my double/triple stitching and one side came completely off. I went to Walmart to look for a better quality ribbon. I ran into a neighbor that I don't get to see very often (she goes to a community ward instead of the student ward), and she pointed me towards something even better than the ribbons I was looking at - a thick, braided ribbon that matched the little bag I sewed perfectly! It's going to be SO cute when I switch the purse string. I was going to break out the sewing machine tonight, but I forgot until after Emma was in bed and I keep it in a storage closet in her room. Yeah, not gonna risk waking her up for that.

Now, I know very little about sewing. I've made a few things, but they've all been very simple: curtains, nursing cover, simple quilt, hemming, and now this little purse. I have yet to learn to use a pattern. I did buy a PJ bottom one recently (and some fabric) to make John some new PJ pants. All his lightweight ones are pretty much trashed. I just need Jessica or someone else to help me with it. Problem is, everyone around me who sews is in school. I also have issues trying to set my machine up. I can thread the bobbin, I can thread the needle, but catching the needle on the bobbin...I have the hardest time with that. I have a very old machine (my mom bought it when I was a baby...), so it's not one of the easy-to-use machines of today. But it's a good, sturdy metal one and it works great. It's the user that's the problem;)

Aaaanyway, this wasn't going to be about sewing LOL. This is supposed to be about my new page. Normally, I do the ABC pages in sets of 2, so I can see how they'll fit together when printed. But this page took too much time for me to do another tonight! And the P page requires an extraction. I'll wait on that till at least tomorrow. So, without further ado, here is my O is for Outside page:



Credits:
Background paper - East West Scraps, A Walk in the Park
Textured overlay (on hills and background) - Tammy Jackson
Crumpled overlay (on hills) - Princess Kate Designs
Sun and clouds - Kasie:)
Leafy trees (recolored) - Waterlo Project, In the Sleeping Orchard
Bare tree and bike - NewLife Dreams, A Walk in the Park
Birdhouse - Jamie Dell, Spring is in the Air
Bird - Choukette, Sweet Envy
Butterfly - Scrapidea, A Walk in the Park
Kite, bee, caterpiller, snail - Goth Kittie, Vite Vite Printemps
Flowers - Nanine, Waiting for Spring
Paper grass - Redju, Paper Grass CU freebie
Font - My Own Topher
Atomic Cupcake action - painted wood

Oh, we did go swimming today, and it was fun, but trying to get dried off and dressed in a locker room with a toddler all by myself is VERY difficult! She kept trying to run away when I was trying to change! Yeah...next time I'll be sure to have other girls around when we go change. Nathan, Jessica, and Victoria all went swimming with us, but they left a little before we did, so I didn't have anyone to help with Emma in the locker room. And I'm not comfortable with the idea of her going into the men's locker room with John to change.

Anyway, I'd best go to bed. We've got a looooong day ahead of us tomorrow. John has home teaching at 9:45 AM, ward audit at 10:20 (he's the financial clerk), we both have an activities committee meeting at noon, church from 1-4 (during naptime...so no nap for Emma), a linger longer that we're in charge of, choir practice and I'm directing since I'm the assistant choir director and we don't HAVE an actual choir director right now (I REAAAALLY hope they find someone ASAP - and NOT ME!), and then John has to do more financial clerk stuff afterwards. Just shoot me now. This sounds horrible, and I feel so guilty for it, but...I'm starting to really hate/dread Sundays. They're supposed to be relaxing days spent with family - um...how is this relaxing? Yeah. It's not. And John being gone all morning before church and all afternoon after church doesn't exactly count as spending time with family. Oh, and have I mentioned that Emma doesn't nap on Sundays? Yeah...THAT'S fun...cranky toddler for the last half of the day. Thankfully John offered to take Emma with him to both his before church responsibilities. Yay! I'll actually be able to shower before church on Sunday! (I usually end up showered Saturday night instead.) But it's still going to be a long day. Hopefully it will turn out well, but I'm not feeling very optimistic about it. I'm dreading it.

We're having another speed scrap on BAM tomorrow, too, but I'm not sure if our hostess has decided what time we're doing it. Based on my insane schedule tomorrow, I will only be available for the evening slot. But with such a stressful day, I'm not sure if a speed scrap would be GOOD or BAD for me.

And now I'm babbling. But I'm definitely feeling better than I was when I ranted in my LiveJournal, for those of you who have access there (it's friends only - can't share EVERYTHING about my life with the whole internet;)). Time to sign off before I babble even more. Night all!