Once again . . .

a post to say sorry I haven't posted in forever and that I'm going to try to be better LOL! How many times have I said that now? Oh well. I figured that with a new little one on the way (yeah, for those of you who don't know yet - I'm pregnant!)I'll need a place to share photos of her and stories about her etc. So, the old blog is back in action! And, of course, I'm sure I'll still have some scrapbooking news, knitting/crocheting projects to share and the occasional rant to get off my chest, so all the more reason to revisit blogging.

So, since it's the New Year, how about a few of the things I want to do this year? I'm not one for "resolutions" per se, but I do like to evaluate what I'm doing in life and add new things or get rid of old things around this time, so here's the short list of what I've come up with so far - mostly art related at this point, but of course LEARNING TO BE A MOM will top the list!

1. I want to do more hands-on artwork this year. I've gotten some great colored pencils, watercolor crayons, paint and so forth and I really want to start doing some art journal pages and playing around with them - nothing fancy, just something for me!

2. I want to do the Simply Me challenge at Scrapartist. I did it with Jess the first time around, but I fizzled out somewhere a few months in (okay maybe even earlier than that LOL!). So, this time I'm going to use a template I have from Jessica Sprague and keep it really simple. No major artistic decisions necessary, just pick a photo or two, add some journaling and away you go. I might even do the whole thing in one kit so I don't have to pick papers for every page. We'll see if I have a kit that strikes me the right way to live with for the duration.

3. I want to do more Quirk challenges. I love Digital Art Quirks and I've really gotten away from it since being pregnant. Time to dive back in - it really gets my creative juices flowing.

4. I want to make a lot of knitted/crocheted stuff. I will use up the stuff in my stash - unlike digiscrapping supplies, yarn takes up a lot of room, so I need to dig in!

5. I want to do some sewing projects. I got a new sewing machine on Black Friday and I want to keep it in use.

6. On a note related to all of these projects, I want to get rid of some stuff! I have a lot of stuff and with the baby coming, we need to make room, so I need to make some decisions about what stays and goes. My collection of scrapbooking magazines is the first thing on the chopping block. I went through it this weekend and have a giant stack of them to take to Bookmans this weekend. Next I'm moving on to clothes and books, we'll see how that goes.

7. I want to continue to improve my photography skills. I still have a lot of learning and practice to do with my Rebel, but I'm loving it so far! I also got a Tracy Joy bag for Christmas from DH, so now it's really easy to take it around with me! Love it :)

8. I want to keep up on my new housework plan. I fell of the wagon a bit over Christmas, but I managed to keep the place pretty clean doing a little bit each day for a couple of weeks before that. It's nice to have a clean house.

Okay, that's a pretty good list - if I can just do a little of each one I'll be pretty happy with the state of things!