Jamie's Rainbow by Inspired by Dominic

This kit, which you can get from Inspired by Dominic Designs, is great. Here are two pages from our mini holiday to Brandon.  The pool pictures I took but the rest of the goodies are from the kit.

I do not...

For Faith Sisters I did a page about things I am not - hardest was choosing 10, but the fun part was using Mel's Natural Beauty kit (see link on previous post)!  It is way time for sleep though, almost 1 am and here I am bloggin' and scrappin' - weirdness!

Farm Girl Me!

We had a great day - we rode, we walked, we fenced, we played and had a great farm day!  I am on with Mel at A+Designs and had to use her kit for my page of some of today's photos.  Sadly I missed the Luke riding photos (I was walking with him leading Belle) but we did get some other great ones. Look for them soonest!

Stay warm, stay dry and stay happy!

Make a Joyful Noise

Psalm 100 - Make a joyful noise to the Lord

Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the lands! 
Serve the Lord with gladness! Come into God's presence with singing! 
Know that the Lord is God! It is he that made us, and we are his;
we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. 
Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise! 
Give thanks to him, bless his name! 
For the Lord is good; 
his steadfast love endures for ever, 
and his faithfulness to all generations.

When I listen to Luke say his prayers, it is usually with a high degree of enthusiasm and often he sings them rather than says them.  He likes to talk to God with the joy of a little boy, just like Psalm 100.  We have our prayers for bedtime, we thank God for our food and for wonderful things we enjoy each day.  It is very humbling to see someone embrace fully joyful worship.

It did get me thinking that perhaps he is on the right track for him, and I think that nature and the world around us also praises with the same exuberance and joy.  Birds, flowers and trees in their riot of color, texture and song praise their Creator.  The roaring rivers, the rushing waterfalls and the endless waves add their notes to the endless song.  Even the seemingly senseless barking of my blind dog plays a role, as they are all creations of the Creator's hand.  

Our senses are gifts which allow us to experience the world around us.  Many would argue they are genetically selected functions which enhance the survival of our species, and yes to some degree they do fulfill that function (not was well for us as for some animals but we have other advantages sometimes).  I would argue they also serve a purpose for the survival of our souls and spirits - they allow us to sense and embrace the world around us in ways that feeds our spiritual selves, and brings us closer to God.  I do not believe that nature and all her wonders are meant to be a distraction from God, but rather a reminder of just how magnificent the hand is that can bring us beauty, wonder and joy. 

Spring, for those of us lucky enough to enjoy it as a season, brings hope from a dark dormant season, it brings life new and renewed, and it allows us after many months of monochromatic living to burst into a multicolored riot for the senses.  The world, after the silence of winter, bursts forth in joyful noise with the works of the Creator.  Just as my little boy bursts out in joyful praise, so do we when we allow the spirit of joyful praise into our worldm, into our lives and allow it to feed the gardens of our souls.  Let the birds sing, let the flowers bloom, let the new life that is waiting come forth and fill us with a joyful noise.

Be brightly blessed, always and in all ways!

Catching Up!

Things have been a bit busy around these parts, I'm part of two CT's now and that's pretty exciting!  Inspired by Dominic Designs and A+Designs. Make sure to check out their stores from the links in my posts :-)  We are busy with spring flooding things - not at our place but helping out where we can. It's been very wet, and although the past few days were very nice, it's a bit cooler out today.  We have been spending lots of time outside, even on cooler days, because we are SO TIRED of winter! Luke asks each morning, "Can I go outside for even 10 minutes?" and we have been lucky enough to spend hours a day outside. Checking fence, cleaning up the yard, getting the flower beds ready and of course thinking about planting flowers, gardens and mowing lawns.  I did a 'frame' challenge recently on Scrapbook Flair and some pages for the various kits I've tried. Check them out:

Quote Challenge

I used the Spring Blossoms blog train mini by Inspired by Dominic Designs.  It was for a Creative Team Quote Challenge - what fun!  Enjoy...

At The Shop

For Luke, spending time with his Deeda and Grandpa are amongst the best things he can do. Going to the shop to see Grandpa and all the big machines puts him over the moon and a ride in a loader can be the topper for the whole week!  We did just that, and of course I took photos.  60+ pictures later and many layouts to come I've done two more pages.  I used Inspired By Dominic Designs CopperWorks Kit and the great Granite Alpha.  

Paper Pages and Projects

Luke and I had fun tonight doing some 'Easter' present pages for his Grandma, Grandpa and Alberta Grandparents (Grandma Jacki and Papa Dude).  He did one for his Deeda, but Deeda wasn't feeling well enough to help him do one for Mama...that's okay little man!  Mama knows you do great pages!

I'll post pictures tomorrow - he cuts, crops, glues and uses stickers.  We sure had fun and he explained why he did each thing on the page and then proudly went to show his Daddy (Deeda).  It makes my heart feel so good to see him proud of his creations, and have fun doing them.

I think I'll chat more when I post his photos tomorrow, did a new blog header (did you notice?) and am hoping my DH can sleep through the night with his bronchitis...poor big guy!  I love them so much...so tomorrow I'll chat about the preschool scrapbook project I am doing and show you Luke's latest pages. Night all!  

Note: decided to 'edit' rather than do a new post so the pages won't get lost :-)  Here are some of Luke's creative pages on my Facebook album.  Click here!

Tropical Get Away...

This great kit is available at: http://inspiredbydominicdesigns.blogspot.com/ and this is my creation with it, more to come but had to share this one...photos from today, sentiments from today as well from my little man Luke.  I call it "Wish We Were Here" and I think you will agree!

New Kits, New Collab - Come & Play!

It's been a busy couple of days, even with Earl not feeling well, doing house stuff, furniture stuff and studying and watch the snow s-l-o-w-l-y melting....no really warm days but the must be just around the corner. Question is how far are we from that corner?  :-)

I did a new page with Aisne's new kits, check them out here: http://aisne-creations.blogspot.com/  They are for the new challenge so you gotta do it!  I did my page using the boy colors, and it's a 'pre trip' page for when we go to Disney World next year!  I did it using my 'dream' resort, we may not stay there but we'll visit it often I'm sure!

This collab kit is awesome, and even better you get to see some great designers and their blogs..check  it out at: 

http://twistedscrapper.blogspot.com/

Don't forget to check out all the designers and leave them some love - everyone li

kes that!

I rode the Spring Blog Train...

and it was awesome, not that I'm done yet...there are 91 (you saw it correctly ninety one) designers contributed so when you are done you'll have a HUGE mega kit. All for FREE!  Thanks to everyone who did this...Amazing stuff.

I've put my name in to a couple of designers for being on the Creative Team - something I really enjoy. Cross yer fingers...

Speaking of crossing fingers, we are all still hoping that the flooding won't be terrible here or for our friends once again in North Dakota.  We are getting ready and prepared for the worst which is better than not planning at all.  Another blog from someone in North Dakota is Jill DZine!  Check it out...

Going to do some pages, check the animals and help my DH study for his last three exams...then he is done his Ag Diploma...wahoooo!!

More later when the coffee kicks in...just had to let you know about the Blog Train!

Not spring showers, spring snows...

And here we go again with the snow - at least it's going to slow down the run off, a bit, but with the ice everywhere I'm not sure if it will gain us much ground for flooding.  It could end up delaying things rather than actually preventing them...but in the spirit of spring, and wanting needing wishing hoping and praying for spring...okay I give up we'll have what we'll have.  Just might delay our spring planting, our cows might calve on less green grass and our spring road trip might not happen when we thought...no worries...just the way things go! C'est la vie!

But of course we are getting close to the end of exams, and you'll probably find a long rant about being done school on my sweet hubby's blog at http://smilincoyoteranch.blogspot.com once he has time after exams are over and he is destressed.

For now I'm doing my work on my working group, volunteering with MERA and the new Steinbach Humane Society and of course hanging out with my little man Luke and my big man Earl.  We have a busy few weekends coming up with a presentation, a scrapping crop and a fundraiser (find out more at http://steinbachhumane.blogspot.com).

Here are my new pages...enjoy...share your comments and hopefully I'll be doing some CT pages again and there'll be even more from great designers.