Sherri's (Never A Dull Moment) World

Why I Blog...

I can hardly believe it.

Today is the one year anniversary of my blog!  I was tickled with myself for reaching this milestone. I know I have not posted every day, but that was not my original intent. I originally started this activity to fulfill one of my "Year of Distractions".  While Nick was serving in Iraq, I took it upon myself to start something new for each month that he was gone overseas. I NEEDED to be distracted. I NEEDED something, anything to keep the worry of having a son at war from dominating my being.

So I decided to blog. And it has given me a great sense of personal satisfaction. I am not blogging to become famous. Instead it serves as a means to stay connected with my family and friends. It enables me to tell the stories of my life.... and there are sooooooooo many stories. And I happen to love photos. Though scrapbooking continues to be one of my favorite hobbies, I really love adding photos to my blog to add dimension to my thoughts and stories.

It makes me happy that Bill reads my blog-- he tells all of his friends that even though he is lives with me, my stories make him laugh out loud! My blog gives me another way to express my love for him.

It makes me happy that my kids all check my blog. Whether they are near (Jeremiah & Angela) or far (Natasha) (Nick)... they want to see the latest pics and read the latest family news. Natasha says my blog makes her homesick. Nick says my blog makes him feel connected. And he loved the recent pics from our visit to see him!  Sometimes my kids call to talk about my latest movie review or to laugh about what the chickens are up to.  My blog enables me to talk about my greatest love-- my family.

I have A LOT of interests and love to learn new things. My blog lets me air some of the thoughts that are trapped in my head. Blogging has created a new outlet to maintain my sanity!

Last, but not least, blogging has few rules. Blogging gives me the freedom to experiment with different writing styles, from making lists to telling meaningful stories. I love that. I [heart] blogging. :)

A New Year!

We did it. We survived another year. Maybe "survived" is a bit harsh. How about-- we LIVED another year?! Sometimes the act of living can be joyful, sometimes hard, sometimes we take it for granted and it becomes mundane.  For most of my year, I felt like I was barely breathing. I sometimes lived on auto-pilot. Having a son serving in a war-torn country will do that to you. I don't remember making a New Year's resolution last January... instead I vowed to carry on with my "Year of Distractions". I can honestly say that my personal "distractions" helped. Some of them ended after the month, others continued on. Here is what I did to stay "distracted":

December 2008 - I created a December Daily mini-album. Ali Edwards has made one for several years. I have talked myself out of making one before because the holidays get too crazy. But I actually enjoyed it and love my finished result. And I made mine cover the entire month (Dec. 1-31) instead of up until Christmas...

January 2009 - I created a website for parents/families/wives of Nick's platoon soldiers deployed to Iraq for one year. Our private website allowed us to share information from emails & phone calls with our sons, offer advice, give support and encouragement, and post photos. Having been through this experience before with Jeremiah (twice)-- it helped me to help them.

February - I took up knitting. Throughout the year I made 4 beanies (hats), 4 scarves and have 3 other scarves in progress. That is a lot of knitting!

March - We received wonderful news! Angela & Jeremiah were pregnant!! So I began my search for my future "grandma-name".... Together, Bill and I are "Papa" and "Honey". Isn't that cute?!!

April - My birthday is in April. I decided to begin a photography project called a "Project 365". I am happy to say that this project is still in progress.... I have finished 9 months already!!! I love my album, am grateful that it gives me a reason to observe my life and also pay attention to the details. I think I am becoming a better photographer too. :)

May - I bought 10 chicks with the intention to raise them for eggs. I had NO IDEA that this idea would be sooooo much fun!! Or sooooo much work!!  But the fun definitely outweighs the work....and their eggs are lovely. I love my 9 beautiful hens and their quirky personalities.

June - We built a raised bed garden, fenced it in (to keep deer and chickens out), and I planted our first round of "crops". We grew strawberries, tomatoes, corn, green beans, zucchinis, pumpkins, lemon cucumbers, sugar peas and sunflowers! I was surprised by how rewarding it was to watch our veggies grow. We ate as much as we could, gave some away and fed our fresh produce to our chickens. Yummy!

July- This was our month for adventure. Bill & I took mini-vacations to go ziplining, whale watching, and white-water rafting. Loved them all!

August - Ta daa! I decided to begin a blog. 

September - I threw a virtual baby shower for Angela. I made a fake Angela to attend the shower while we played games, opened baby presents and had refreshments. Then I mailed all of it to her in Spain.

October - I decided to jumpstart one of our Christmas presents for the kids and grandparents. I created a new photobook with Shutterfly . It turned out great! Here is a peek at our 2009 book:

 

 

November - This was the month that Bill and I were working on the house deal for Jeremiah & Angela. Bill was in charge of communicating with our realtor; I was in charge of dealing with the mortgage broker. Thank goodness for email as we sent photos/documents/updates to J & A in Spain! We closed the deal in December and they have a new house to come home to! Woo Hooooo!

And Nick did his job and returned to the USA safely just before Thanksgiving. Our year was over!Whew! What a year it was...

I hardly know where the month of December went. Besides the "usual" holiday madness of working, decorating the house, and shopping for presents-- we shopped for new living room furniture, frantically cleaned the house, threw a couple of parties for family and friends, picked up Nick for 6 fun-filled days and then returned him to the airport.

For 2010 I have decided to make a new resolution. My goal is to DECLUTTER my house, my yard, and my life. We have interesting stuff stashed all over the house and it is slowly driving me crazy. My mail basket is always about ready to explode. I have to tiptoe into my crowded closet. I keep the laundry doors closed because I always have piles of laundry waiting to be folded. Bill refused to make a pact with me (he likes his STUFF); so I am on my own. Wish me luck! What is your New Year's resolution??

My October Distraction

Last year I created a photobook on Shutterfly as a unique Christmas gift. I ordered 6 copies-- one for each of our kids, one for us and one for each set of grandparents. Shutterfly photobooks come in two sizes: the 8" x 8" (my favorite) and the 12" x 12". I chose a theme, "A Year in Review" , and then uploaded a bunch of photos to fill in the designated spaces. What I loved about it was that I could choose and rearrange different page layouts, add my own text and document some of our travel and adventures from 2008. I could hardly wait to see the final product...

I was THRILLED when my order arrived! Here is what the front cover looked like:

 

Here is a peak at some of the inner pages...

And the back cover looked like this:

 

While I was working on my Shutterfly photobook, I received a coupon to try out a competitor's photobook. So I went to Snapfish, uploaded a bunch of our photos from our trip to Paris last summer, and built an 8"x 11" photobook. I appreciated the free photobook offer, but I was disappointed with the simple pages and the lack of options. It WAS a photobook, but it did not really tell a story.

So, long story short, I wanted to give my business to Shutterfly again this year. They were offering some awesome photobook specials last month (and free shipping!) so I decided to build a sequel for 2009 Christmas presents. I spent a couple of weekends collecting photos for my new theme and uploaded them into my Shutterfly account. I chose a different theme and customized the pages. The early bird specials actually expired last week on my surgery day-- so I stayed up until midnight the night before adding the finishing touches to my new photobook and placing the order. [Note: it was a great way to reduce pre-surgery anxiety!] I can HARDLY wait for them to arrive...

If you take lots of pictures--I URGE you to try this someday for yourself! I prefer Shutterfly, but you can create photobooks at Snapfish.com, Costco.com, scrapbooks etc.com and other services. Shop for the style and size that you want. There will be many pre-Christmas promotions for weeks to come... My experiences with both Shutterfly and Snapfish were both reasonable with delivery in less than 2 weeks. And you can build your photobooks at your own pace, you just save them to your account and place your order when you feel like it!

Sherri's bottom line:  I LOVE photobooks. :)

My May Distraction

Bill and I talked during our long winter about what we could do to be “green”. Not the color green, but to be conscientious about the environment. I have recycled for many years, but we could do more. So we talked about putting in a garden… about raising bees… about composting bins… about rainwater barrels… and about raising chickens for eggs.  After consulting some websites and buying a “how-to” book, I decided to buy chicks and get ready for a new distraction.

This seemed easy. We have always had pets and I tend to be the “nurturer” of the house. However, this was going to be an experiment. We do not live on a farm. We have a generous acre in the suburbs. These were going to be “suburban chicks”. How many should we start with? After talking to some other teachers at Bill’s school, one recommended getting 8-12 chicks because they might not all live.  We went to the local feed store and came home with 10 downy chicks—2 each of 5 different varieties.  I giggled, because if the little signs were right, I should have white, brown and green eggs one day.

The Rodgers chicks started out in a long, rectangular aquarium with a heat lamp, cedar shavings and their food & water dishes. They were so cute! Especially when they fell asleep at night.

 

After a few weeks, they started to fill in with feathers. They were getting more active.  So I came up with the concept of a “chick recess”. For their first outdoor chick recess, I put them in an empty tractor tire rim—5 at a time—in the front yard. This was their first time experiencing grass, dandelions, little twigs, etc.  They were so curious.

They were getting bigger, growing more feathers, and kind of getting on each other’s chick nerves.  I was giving them more chick recesses, but they were outgrowing their container. So Bill spent a whole weekend building a solution to our problem: the custom-made Chick Condo. It has two levels, little windows, 3 future nesting boxes, some perches and storage for food containers. I could open up doors and latches on 3 sides for access to future eggs and cleaning.

We set it up on our back deck and moved the chicks into the Condo.

 

And they liked it! So that is how I came to be a “Chicken Mama”. More stories to follow!!

My April Distraction

In the scrapbooking world, there has been some buzz about a new kind of project.  It is often referred to as a "Project 365" and tends to focus more on photography rather than scrapbooking/designing pages.  Why the "365"? This project means making a commitment to carrying a camera around with you and to document your daily life, that is  365 days of a year, with a photograph a day.  I thought about it last year and put it aside. Many scrapbookers began their own projects on New Years Day, to document the beginning and continue throughout 2009. I decided to try it this year-- but to begin it on my birthday and document an actual year in my life. I won't say how old I am -- but my birthday is in April and it is the perfect distraction material! 

Many scrapbookers are storing the results of their daily work in different manners. I chose to use a leather 12" x12" binder with plastic pocket pages.

Each 2-page spread will represent a full week with a title card in one pocket, seven pockets holding 4" x6" photos (for each day of the week"), and the lower four pockets hold journaling cards (same size as index cards) so that a little paragraph can be written to correspond with each day (describing what is in the photo). I am also using my own handwriting on each journaling card-- that makes it even more "my own".

What I love most about this project is the freedom to choose what to use for my daily material. I thought it would be cumbersome to carry around a camera ALL THE TIME-- but it really isn't. I can photograph things I love, my family activities, or use the camera for artistic shots. Anything goes! This is my life -- and my distraction.

My March Distraction

 What could I take on this month?? In the beginning of the month, we bought a Wii Fit. We weighed in with our new Miis (our game characters) and set fitness goals before playing the games. Oh, no! Was I going to commit myself to losing weight this month? After a long, cold winter I guess I could afford to lose a few pounds... 

Thankfully, something else happened to take the place of my "distraction". Our oldest son, Jeremiah, and our daughter-in-law, Angela, are both corpsmen in the U.S. Navy and currently stationed in Spain.  We have been bugging them for awhile to get started on having a family.  They will both be 26 this year. Jeremiah served two tours in Iraq as a medic for Marines and Angela served on the U.S. Mercy  which provided aid to parts of Indonesia after the Christmas 2004 tsunami.  Together or apart, they have had several great years together.  So it was a welcome surprise when they called to tell us that they were finally pregnant! Woo Hoooooo!! Whether a boy or a girl, it will be a beautiful baby.

Is this enough to be a distraction? Yes, when you put a spin on this new development (literally).  This means that Bill and I will be GRANDPARENTS. That is big news! This also means that I better get moving on my "grandma name".  This has been a joke in our family for a couple of years because Bill has his "grandpa" name picked out and I don't. He decided awhile ago that he will be called Papa Sage-- after all, "sage" stands for wisdom and he does know everything. But I am just too young to be called "Grandma" or "Granny"! So this gives me several months to pick out my "Grandma name".... I am currently polling everyone I know for good ideas. I even Googled it. I am asking women who are grandmothers what they are called and why. Some look confused as to why I am making such an ordeal out of it and others laugh and say they were in the same boat. This is definitely exciting and something to ponder.

Jeremiah sometimes calls me "Sugar Mama"-- I said that might make a good name! Bill immediately vetoed it, saying it sounded like a stripper's name. I told Pat at work about Bill's name (Papa Sage) and she said I should be called "Mama Spice". I think she was thinking of the herb, called sage, not the wisdom. Bill vetoed that one too. One girlfriend suggested that I be called "Glama"-- unfortunately, most babies have a hard time with "l"s when they are learning to talk, which means I would end up being called "Gramma" anyway. Another woman told me about her best friend who was a Grandma. When her grandkids come over and ask her to read a book, she always says she is too busy.  They ended up calling her Grandma TooBusy-- I don't want that one either. See how hard this is????

At the moment, I am leaning towards being called "Honey"..... "Honey" and "Papa Sage", sounds nice together. :)

February's Distraction

It is true: I LOVE art. I have experimented with many, many aspects of arts & crafts throughout my life; some were fads, some continue to feed my soul. I used to sew, knit, crochet, make quilts, cross-stitch-- then I moved on to other things. I used to draw, watercolor, paint-- now I use these skills when I need them. I used to decorate elaborate cakes, redecorate rooms in my house, make custom jewelry-- I am still very much into interior design. Several years ago, I began to take advantage of having a husband who is a professional photographer and to create stories and pages of art using our family as my inspiration to scrapbook. I am still passionate about photography & scrapbooking and it gives me artistic satisfaction and happiness every time I build a layout or a mini-album or project. Bill remodeled our computer room so I could have my own scraproom--I think he really loves me.:)

I decided to revisit some of my old talents this year and get distracted. I thought maybe I would re-learn how to crochet and make a scarf or two. There are so many beautiful yarns these days, why not? Well, Natasha spent a couple of afternoons with her Granny and learned how to knit beanie hats. She looked like she was enjoying her new hobby so much, I asked her to teach me. What do you know? Natasha is an excellent teacher! (must be genetic, ha!) This month I have knitted two beanie hats and I am in love with my latest distraction! I found out : 1) it is very calming to knit while watching TV, 2) I can knit while in the car without getting carsick, 3) the projects are fun & fast, and 4) I am drawn to soft, fuzzy angelhair yarns that just feel good in my hands and against my skin. Aaaahhhhhhhhhh....

So, you say you need a distraction? Take up knitting! You just might enjoy yourself.

January's Distraction

I was thinking about my need for distractions this year and realized that I have succeeded in this pursuit for both January & February! Here is what I spent part of January doing:

[The back story] Nick deployed for Iraq in early December. Before he left, he mailed letters to all of the parents/wives of the soldiers he is in charge of describing their upcoming deployment assignment, reassurance that each soldier was well-trained and ready, and a personal note for what he thought of each man. He mentioned in his letter that we, his parents, had been through this before (with Jeremiah's 2 tours in Iraq) and that we would be adopting his platoon during this tour. He listed our names and email address, with instructions to contact us if anyone had any questions. A few emails trickled into our mailbox in December, asking what they could do to help and how to send care packages to Iraq. I began composing group emails (and sending them to the growing list of parents, extended family members, wives, fiances, girlfriends of these soldiers) and delivering information. I provided tips on what to send/not to send in care packages; I shared tidbits from Nick's phone calls; I offered a listening ear to anyone who had not been through this before. The family support grew!

[My distraction] So I decided to research and develop a blog so I could connect all of these people. I did not want it to be all about me. Instead I wanted to start discussions, be able to share posted photos, and create a "place" to talk about things. I chose to create a webpage using myfamily.com and made it open, by invitation only, for each person in my Alpha Company family support group to join. The website is perfect! It has features that fit my original needs perfectly and is very interactive, with a sense of privacy to what we are sharing. Right now it has 34 members, with a dozen or so pending invitations, and people are checking it daily. It makes me feel so good knowing that I can help each of these family members cope with a long (12 month) deployment. I remember during J's tours feeling like we lived each day on pins & needles. Bill and I would get edgy, irritated, anxious if there was a long time between phone calls. We worried about J constantly and I think we silently held our breath until the moment he returned to American soil, safe at last. We didn't have any friends or family with kids in the military, so we felt like we were all alone during each deployment. Though having Nick deployed overseas is just as hard to deal with, it is slightly lessened with the contact we have with the others. Bill says I am the perfect "Mama Bear" for this group-- always looking out for the others and trying to make their situations better. Maybe that is what makes me smile... and keeps me distracted. :)

2009--A Year of Distractions

 I'm back! Let me explain my posting title today... we have a son in Iraq. Nick is a 1st LT in the US Army, 82nd Division of the Airborne Rangers. We have been through "this" before; that is, having a son in harm's way. Our oldest son, Jeremiah, is an US Navy medic and has completed two tours of duty in Iraq. While J was deployed, we lived from phone call to phone call. We were edgy, sometimes irritated, constantly worrying about whether J was safe and hoping not to see the military green car in our driveway, delivering bad news. Bill checked the military casualty list daily; with so many soldiers dying or being injured, it was a somber time for us. We did not have any friends or family with sons/daughters serving in the military so we felt very alone with what we were experiencing as parents. It was HARD; we felt such a rush of relief when each of J's tours were over and he was back on American soil.

Now it is Nick's turn to serve in Iraq and we are back to holding our breath again. We answer the phone, day or night, because it might be a call from Nick. Nick is deployed for a 12 month tour and we are almost at 3 months down, 9 to go. We are back to being edgy again-- it is hard to explain. So I have designated 2009 as being my personal year of distraction. I NEED things to be distracted with, so I do not dwell on the worry. Some parts of my life are the same-- I work full-time, I have my favorite TV shows & Internet sites, I hang out with Bill, Natasha & Shadow, we meet with friends and I continue to be passionate about photography & scrapbooking. But, I need more.... So I have started to knit. I have started a website for the families & loved ones of Nick's Company. I am looking for new things to try to keep my mind busy. And though "being distracted" is often associated with a slightly negative tone--- for me, "being distracted" is just what I need to get by.

Thanks for listening.