I’m actually on babysitting duty for Paige, Corbin & Ainsley tonight. I’m quite certain they’ve forgotten that last time I was in charge for a night Paige & Corbin were awake till like 9:30 and Ainsley didn’t fall asleep till well after 10. Now with school and all I’m hoping things go much smoother tonight. Talk about being outnumbered though. And I just found out last night that I get Eva on Saturday. Celena will be staying overnight and when I tell her we’re watching Eva she’ll be so thrilled. This past weekend I had a girlfriend overnight Saturday after our trip to Chicago so Celena’s room was occupied but she actually left a slumber party early to make sure she could still make it to church and to my parents for Sunday dinner to see all the babies. Unfortunately everyone was either out of town or ill and she had to settle for running into Kylie at Target. My MIL says she plans her whole weekends around spending time with her Auntie Shawny but I’m pretty sure it’s really to see all her ‘cousins’ as she calls them. Oh well, I’ll take what I can get. :)

Sooo, while I’m chasing Paige & Corbin while holding Ainsley Tivo will be busy recording the Dancing with the Stars face-off and the finale of Big Brother. I’ll probably save Dancing with the Stars to watch with Jill on Thursday although I’d kinda like to see…

Total chic flick with one of my favorite actresses & after seeing Sahara recently (kindof disappointing) Mark Ruffalo may actually be in the running for my favorite leading man. I’m not giving up on Matthew yet but I really hope he’s choosier about his next film.

Well, busy day ahead. Oh, video of the day – Anna Nalick – I love the artistry of this video and I just love her voice. Her entire CD is excellent and is still at the top of my list. :)

Call me nuts but I like it frantic. My video of the day today is ‘frantic’ by Jamie O’Neall and that pretty much sums up how I live. Seems like I’m always busy doing something or thinking about what I’ve gotta do next. I must love it this way because I seem to take on more and more all the time. The wonderful thing about it lately is that I’ve been taking on more of the things I enjoy.

This weekend I took a break from my typical frantic pace and took off for Chicago. I think it’s quite possibly my favorite city. I’ve only been to New York city once and it was at a time when the city was really not quite itself yet. I’d love to go back someday and experience it in it’s everyday NYC glory. But Chicago has more to offer than I can ever fit in in a weekend and I always feel completely safe there. It’s amazingly clean for how enormous it is and I love how big cities are such a collection of different cultures.

Got to shop at some of my favorite places: Anthropologie & Urban Outfitters – LOVE these stores! And we had lunch at my favorite restaurant – The Cheesecake Factory. Went to a salsa club called Chromium where we got to dress up and experience a different area of Chicago. Ate hamburgers from Five Faces on Rush Street at 1 am and found a new breakfast spot called West Egg Cafe and sat at a table outside which always seems so appropriate in a big city. :)

Hoping to get back to Chicago one more time this year to see the city in lights which I think actually starts soon. Seems like cities decorate for the holidays earlier and earlier every year. Next trip though is to Philadelphia for the Digital Scrapbooking Convention. Starting to get excited about this one. I’m not one for planning trips so far ahead because I’m soooo impatient but now that it’s getting closer I’m starting to let myself get pumped about it. I LOVE flying so I’m excited to do that again for the first time this year. And I can’t wait to meet so many of the people that I’ve been working with for the past year or so at SBB. :) Then in December I’ll be taking a tropical vacation with my friend Mary. We started talking about going back to New York City over the holidays but found out it would be MUCH cheaper to go somewhere tropical and in December, when it’s below freezing here, tropical sorta wins out. I’ve actually never been anywhere further south than Florida and have only seen photos of the beautiful resorts like the ones we’re looking at staying in. I’m excited to take so many photos that I can make some sort of fun album just for that trip. Hoping to get one early Christmas present before the trip so I can have 2 great lenses to take along. Still lovin’ my 55 lens but something with a zoom that’s just as sharp as that one sure would be nice. Dino’s found me one for about $350 so I’ll just have to design a few more wedding albums before then. :)

Kay, off to work since it’s Monday again. Busy busy week ahead (or should I say frantic). :)

Wanted to say Happy Birthday to my ‘sista’ this morning. I searched long and hard for a video by one of her favorite artists. Hoping to find something she could dance with the kids to but hotcodez was NOT my friend this morning. Seems like every video I tried was an invalid link. :( Then there were a couple that I previewed of Ushers but none were the ones that I really wanted and most were a little racey for posting on my blog. Tryin’ to keep things PG around here. ;) This video by Joss Stone was one I’d already pasted into my video library and it’s definitely a fun one so hopefully you can boogy down on your birthday and I’ll be there dancin’ with ya in spirit. :) I’ve also got a supa dupa card for ya but that’ll be the afternoon treat. Birthday’s gotta be an all day event ya know. Hope you’re havin a great one sista! :)

I did actually finally finish the LO of Braelynn and I. I ended up having to do it twice. Which is sometimes a good thing when you’re not at all happy with how it’s going but this one I actually didn’t hate so I decided to recreate it exactly the same. I literally was making font adjustments to the journaling when photoshop crashed. UGH! Good to have it finished though and I’m already almost finished with my calendar crop page too. Too tired to finish it tonight but it just needs some final touches and it worked out perfectly for some papers I’ve been dying to use of Dawns. :)

Well, off to bed. I’ll be back to post a new video in the morning. Added bonus to the video-a-day thing is getting me in here posting more often. :)

A whole day to myself. :) Little bit of house-cleaning, maybe a little yard work if it stops raining, pilates this morning (4th day in a row – how many is it to form a habit??), lunch with my sisters and mom, scrapbooking and hopefully finish up something to sell this week at SBB. :)

Today’s video: Sawyer Brown’s ~ They Don’t Understand. Little bit of country but worth a listen even if you’re not a country fan. I think the lyrics are just so profound. Something I know I need to remember when interacting with people. It makes me think of how I felt when we lost Jacob. It was such a strange feeling to go to the store or the bank or wherever it may be and have this enormous weight of our situation and realize the people I’d interact with had NO idea. It’s so easy to think about when you’re on the other side of the situation but how often do I consider what others might be going through. How much kinder would I be if in every interaction I looked at the other person as someone who may be going through something as difficult as losing a child or a father, or is dealing with abuse or the loss of a job? Part of me wants to put this CD in my car and listen to it every morning. Since I’m not a HUGE country fan I’m guessing I’d get tired of it eventually but somehow I want to remember the message of it every day.

Kay, gotta quick do my pilates before DH and his partner head back this way to work in the office. Eventually I hope to look as graceful and flexible as the women in the video but 4 days into it ~ not so much. ;)

I finally figured out how to post a video with my blog. YAY! I know, some that visit my blog are probably shaking their heads. From the family who probably wonders about my taste in music to those of you with your volume turned way up getting a bit of a startle if you were used to silence. *sorry* But I’m SUCH a music nut and I had so much fun searching for oodles of great videos to share here. For the first one I thought this Sarah McLachlan video was timely. I remembered it from when it first came out and it just seemed fitting. I’ve been hesitant to blog about my emotions involving hurricane Katrina because they’ve become so mixed up in politics and beaurocracy that mostly when I think about it all I’m just frustrated. Frustrated with the blame game that took place so quickly. Frustrated with the violent reactions of some which made what was obviously a horrible situation to begin with become something I’d consider to be truly horrific. Frustrated that in my own mind I struggle between, on the one hand, certainly understanding how difficult it would be to leave my home under the circumstances and, on the other hand, that there was a mandatory evacuation. So anyway, I hesitate to post even this vague response of emotions but this IS my journal and the only one I keep so I think it’s good to at least record some of what I’ve been feeling to look back on. Maybe I’ll feel entirely differently about it all a year from now, ya know? My prayers go out to all those affected by the hurricane and especially to those who are still trying to reconnect with their parents or children. Belongings can be replaced but family members can not and I know that I’d be devastated to lose any of mine.

So, back to the lighter subject of my daily video. Stay tuned, I’ve got some GREAT ones ‘on deck’ so-to-speak. :) And if anyone knows of another source for these musical goodies please share. There were some artists and songs that I was unable to find on hotcodez.