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I'm so bummed....Lisa Bearnson does a Kit Of The Month from her website. I really REALLY wanted the December Kit called "Not Your Ordinary Foam Stamp Set". It's this totally cool set of foam stamps. Every time I look at the set I find another one that looks like so much fun! The 12" alpha, 12" circles, HUGE punctuation, big arrows, etc. I ordered the kit bright and early on Dec 1st (at least I thought I did) before running out of the house to start the Arctic Frog warehouse clearance sale. By the time I got home I was exhausted and didn't give the kit another thought. About two weeks later I went to check on my order and see when it might be coming. I couldn't find a confirmation email. OH NO! I went to my bank account to see if I'd been charged...NOPE! AUGH!!! I missed out on the kit because it was sold out by then! I don't know what happened or why my order didn't go through but it didn't and I was out of luck to order it. I've tried to get it on Ebay but the auctions for these are few and far between. It seems like every kit they come out with there's always some people that bought it and aren't pleased with it for whatever reason. It just figures....the kit I'm dying to have and everybody that bought it actually wants to keep it this time! :)
UPDATE *I have finally got my hands on a kit! And now I'm going to a crop this weekend so I'll have lots of time to play with the new stamps!*
While the kids were on holiday break, we had the pleasure of spending a week in San Diego CA with our entire family. What a blast! I can't say it was the most relaxing vacation I ever had because we packed every single day with tons of activities but it has definitely left me with memories for a lifetime. I made a coffee table book from all the pics that I and my siblings-in-law took on blurb.com. I am scheduled to get it today and I'm so anxious to see how it turned out! I'm going to make a small album here though of some of my very fave pics of the trip.
I don't do a lot of commercial printing of my photos ever since I went digital. I do it mostly either myself on my Epson R1800 or through my pro photog. lab that never messes a print up. So sending my photos out to be printed from a source I've never used makes me very nervous. Silly probably, people do it ALL the time...but its the fear of the unknown that makes me uneasy. Well, that and the fact that about 3 Christmases ago, I uploaded a b/w image for our holiday cards to cards.com and they came back HORRIBLE. They tried to redo them for me, but they still turned out awful (really bad tones coming through on the b/w like green and blue) so they ended up refunding my money and I ended up not sending cards out that year. I was pretty confident that it wasn't an error on my part because I'd been uploading regular b/w photos to my pro lab that were coming back just fine so I didn't understand why cards.com couldn't get it right. I guess that's why I'm gunshy now about online digi services.
ANYWAY, back to the bit about the vacation. We went to San Diego Zoo, San Diego Wildlife Park, Legoland, The Birch Aquarium, an afternoon whale watching excursion (didn't get to see a whale though! *humph*) and toured the Midway aircraft carrier museum. We took New Year's Day morning off from touring to watch the Cotton Bowl. Our little family of 4 were the only Mizzou contingent in the room, while the rest (the other 11) were all Razorback fans. So there was more disappointment than jubilation once the Tigers beat those hogs! Go Tigers!
While we stayed in condos right on the beaches of the Pacific Ocean there wasn't much beach playing going on. It was so cold! The water temp couldn't have been above 65 degrees or so but nevertheless, the 5 older kids (of the 6 total) ventured out into the water New Year's Day just to say they went swimming while we were there. BRRRRRR!!! I think they should all be honorary members of the Polar Bear Club by now.
So, we're home and back into our 'normal' routine now. I've closed Arctic Frog and DH is actively looking for gainful employment. I'm not exactly sure what to do with myself these days. I realized a few days ago that I've not been without a plan or something in mind to 'do' since I was about 16 years old. It's a very odd place for me to be, as well as a little uncomfortable. I really just want to take some time, relax, listen to my heart and find out what I really WANT to do. I know the skills that I've learned and I know what I CAN do but I need to find out where my passions lie these days. I didn't really want out of the scrapbook industry but that's where my path seems to have led me. Hopefully soon I'll figure everything out and find a direction in which to point myself.
