I'm an aunt again!

Okay, not an actual flesh-and-blood aunt. But it feels like it! My very good friend Erin gave birth today to a baby boy, a little after 4pm. I don't have any more news yet, don't know his weight, who he looks like, what his name is... I only know that mother and baby are doing fine. This little guy sure gave his parents a roller-coaster ride, what with all the contractions she's been having over the last month. But they went in the hospital last night, and like the good boy that I know he's gonna be, he was born on his actual due-date. :D

So join me in congratulating Erin, Mark and new big brother Ethan!

Sigh. I still remember clearly the day she told me she was pregnant. We were new friends and I felt honoured she shared this with me. I am glad to now call her one of my best friends and I am happy to have been there during this pregnancy. I already love this little guy and I can't wait to meet him!

I love the generosity of other bloggers!

Almost every day, I check out The Pub on Two Peas in a Bucket. I check for page calls, toots and I also love to check out the blogs that have been updated. I'm a big blog lurker, and I have discovered some amazing ladies and some awesome talent. Once in a while, someone will post a RAK. If you don't know what a RAK is, it's a Random Act of Kindness. They usually draw a name from all their comments to win some scrapbook stuff. Well I just found out that Betsy's son picked my name to win some vintage bling! How cool is that?! I love to have a variety of stuff to play with, and this is definitely something I don't already own! So thanks Betsy!

Leaps and bounds, I tell ya!

I don't know if I ever told you this, but Sean is no artist. He draws once in a while, but he doesn't seem all that enthralled by it. Which is okay, mind you. But I was such a little artist when I was a kid, I guess I just expected every kid to be the same, duh!

When he was 3 years and 11 months old (I know, because I wrote down the date!) he drew his first real bonhomme. It was basically a big circle with a nose, mouth, and eyes, arms and legs shaped like loaves of bread and two tiny circles for ears. You'll see that picture soon, I'm planning a layout with it.

Lately, he's taken quite a liking to the blackboard we have in the basement, mostly because Kira loves it, I think! So today he says "Look Mommy, I drew a dinosaur!" Sure enough, there was a dinosaur (see on the left? Okay, so maybe it looks more like Eeyore, but if he says it's a dinosaur, then it's a dinosaur!) A few minutes later he says "Look, a Transformer!" Transformers are his new obsession! A layout is coming with that theme, too! Anyway, doesn't it remind you of Zurg from Toy Story?


I am amazed how much his drawing talents have improved in such a few months! He's becoming quite the little guy. He talks a LOT more than he used to, full sentences and all. Pronunciation is not quite perfect yet, but even strangers are finally able to understand him. He also tries to strike up conversations with other kids. It used to be that when we'd go to the park, he'd play with other kids but he wouldn't talk to them. You know how kids are... They don't need to talk, they have fun no matter what. But now he goes up to them and says "Hi, my name's Sean!"

Today I got him a Happy Meal toy. He got The Penguin in a Submarine that shoots torpedoes. When we went to pick up Keith at work, he shot the torpedoes and lost one of them somewhere in Keith's office. We tried looking for it, but were unsuccessful. So I told him "I'm sorry you lost one of them, Sweetie." You know what he said? "It's okay Mommy, we have one left!" Bless his heart, I love him!

Out of shape much?

Me 3 weeks ago: oh, you know what? I'm gonna take a week off from the gym, I don't have much energy right now.

Me 2 weeks ago: I have a cold, I can't breathe, I can't possibly go train this week!

Me last week: I'm feeling blah. I don't think I'm gonna go train today. Or today. Or today.

Me yesterday, calling Keith at work:
-Sweetie, you know how you asked me to let you know when I start not feeling so good? Like depression symptoms? Well I'm really low on energy and I'm exhausted. This is the first sign of a slump. I need to do something to keep from going downhill.

-You should go train, it'll release endorphins, it'll help.

-okay, if I must...

Me at the gym: Oh, look at that there's a Dance Cardio class starting in 5 minutes. I'll do that instead of my usual eliptical machine/weights routine.

Five minutes into the class:
-This is cool, I had forgotten how fun these classes can be!

Ten minutes into the class:
-This is good, I'm sweating and breathing hard. Let's burn those calories!
-Shoot, I wish there weren't mirrors all around, I hate looking at myself. It's tough to follow the class when I only look at my feet.

Fifteen minutes into the class:
-Man, these steps are complicated! I have trouble following.

Twenty minutes into the class:
-OMGosh, I am *dying*!!!!!!! Isn't this ever gonna end?
(Looking at the clock)
-What?!?!?!?!?! It's only been 20 minutes?! Is there any way I can sneak out of here without being noticed?

Forty minutes into the class:
-Aw crap, I have no more water! And you know what? My brain is slow, I can't possibly make my legs do this! Grapevine. Skate. Double grapevine. Go forward. Turn. WHAT?????!

Tonight, I'm going back to my routine!

Two layout requests!

Yeah! Jane from Scrapbooking & Beyond emailed me to request 2 layouts! I'm so thrilled! If this keeps going, I'll have my camera paid off faster than I thought. Yup, the money I've been earning for publications has been going to pay for my Rebel. I always said publication money would go to treat myself to scrapbooking stuff. Let's be honest here: a camera is a big part of scrapbooking!! Thanks for letting me toot! :D

If you want to see one of my favourite layouts ever, check out page 67 of the current issue of Scrapbooking & Beyond. I absolutely love this layout. I'll post it here when the nex issue comes out.

Also, if you happen to have the September CARDS idea book, I'm supposed to have a card in there, although I haven't seen my copy yet.

Yup, this is a thrilling time for me, I hope you don't mind me sharing this with you!

Two down, 2 to go!

I'm now done with the Twilight series' second book, New Moon. I'm actually almost halfway through the third one, Eclipse. I must admit I didn't enjoy the 2nd book as much as the first one, mostly because there wasn't enough Edward for my taste. I'd definitely be a "Team Edward" girl. Check out this link to see what I mean. If you're for the other guy, click here. I must admit I think I could be "Team Switzerland". Seriously, I might ask for this for Xmas, LOL!

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This made me chuckle this morning! :D

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And here a quick and easy layout I made at the crop on Saturday. I did 5 in total, a record!! I'm only showing you this one though, because I think I'll be submitting the other four. This will be the title page for my Cuba album.

Good things

This morning I went shopping with my pal Noémi. Our main goal was to go to the awesome store Farfelu, full of cutesie, funny, adorable things! You want to come out of there with the whole store! How I managed to get in and out of there in one piece with my kids is amazing! Everything was fun to them! I left with this wallet, but in red instead of green. I fell in love with the smaller version when Bella showed me hers and then when I saw the big one, I knew I'd end up buying it! Adorable, isn't it?

We had a good time. Noémi started shopping for Xmas (her baby is due around that time). I went to Reitmann's, spent money I don't have (I need clothes, what I have looks drab or dated.) I saw my dear friend Linda, it was nice to see her!

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In other news, I finally called Anne, who's a speech therapist that I know, so that she could refer me to the proper person for Sean's speech delay. She gave me a few numbers, but she gave me even more. We talked for a while and basically she told me this: Sean (who's 4) talks at the level of a 3 year-old. She said language is probably not one of his strengths, so learning 2 languages was perhaps a little too much for him (as opposed to Kira who's having no problem at all). So he concentrated on english only, which is why he doesn't speak french at all. It was his way to process it all He can count in french, say his alphabet in french and translate almost every word, but he wont make sentences in french. So she said to focus on the english, so that he could perfect at least one language. Then when he goes to school, french should kick in fairly easily since he'll have been exposed to french at home anyhow. He might be quiet for a few weeks, or even months when he finally goes to school, but he'll end up getting it. That made me feel better. So... to recap. he'll still be exposed to french at home, but I'll focus more on english when I talk to him. If he says a sentence like "I go downstairs and computer" I'll say "You're going to go downstairs and play on the computer? Okay!" It feels good to have an idea of what to do and to know that I didn't do anything wrong to screw up my boy! :D

No KI dt for me :(

I wanted to be part of this dt. Really badly! Love KI. But I was limited in what I had on-hand and had no money to buy extra stuff. So the layouts show that. I actually really like my layouts. But I felt limited and I don't think I showed my full potential. Sigh.

I am not posting my 2nd layout yet since I'm hoping to have it pubbed! :D

I'm not sure if I posted this. I made a few months back for the Scrapbook Centrale DT using ScrapWorks products.

TFL!

I've been sucked in (pun intented!)

I've been meaning to read this 4-book series for a while now. I read on many blogs how much people were loving it. Plus, there's the movie coming out soon. My friend Isabelle (who I will call Bella from now on) lend me the four books on Friday night and I'm done with the first one, Twilight.

It's the love story between a young girl and a vampire. If you don't like vampire stories, don't worry: the emphasis is on love. The sweet, passionate, emcompassing, perfect kind of love. I highly recommend this book, but be warned. You will be lacking sleep because you wont want to put it down!

He makes me laugh!

Yesterday afternoon, I was watching Gosford Park while the kids were having a snack. Sean was talking, but I wasn't paying much attention, I must admit. Then I heard "Right, Mommy?" Well, I didn't react. I mean, I hear that 50 times a day. I was busy, what can I say? So I hear again "Right, Mommy?" and then again "Right, Mommy?" Then "Hello? Is anybody home?" I had to react to that, I thought it was so funny! He didn't say it in a rude way, he just said it matter-of-factly. :)

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So, did any of you watch SYTYCD Canada last night? I sure did and I was in my own little world for 2 hours. I prefer when we get to the top 20, but any dancing is good. I have a few favourites, I'll see if they make it through. I was a little worried about the show before I saw it. Let me try to explain why.

I love American Idol but I'm not a huge fan of Canadian Idol. Why is it, you ask? I think it's because AI is more mainstream while CI is more artsy. Does that make sense? Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed this season of CI and Theo Tams was my favourite from the beginning and I enjoyed him and his music very much. And I thought it was a great season overall, better than previous years. And I actually did enjoy the artsy part of it this time around. But I don't necessarily *get* it. I mean, the likes of Mitch MacDonald, Earl Stevenson and Mookie Morris would've *never* made it on AI. AI is looking for more mainstream performers. And mainstream performers, i *get*, kwim? Other than Theo, I loved Drew Wright, Amberly Thiessen and Sebastian Piggot (pre-Top 10. He completely floundered after that.)

Because of that, I was afraid STYTYC Canada would be different than its american counterpart. Sometimes different is good but in this case, I didn't want that. I wanted the great dancing the way I'm used to watching it. And apparently dancing is a universal language because the dancers were exactly like I wanted them to be: inspiring. And can I just say how refreshing it was that they showed 98% good dancers and only 2% of the "I-can't-dance-but-I-want-to-be-on-TV" dancers, as opposed to the 50/50 we usually see on SYTYCD US. I mean, this dude was more than enough, don't you think? Show me beauty, not crap!

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Here's a layout I made with the new BG line Offbeat. Love it!

And here is the layout that was pubbed in the summer issue of Style & Scrap magazine.

Are You Ready Canada?!

Oh yeah, tomorrow's the night! Thursday Sept 11th on CTV. I am pumped! If you've been reading my blog these past few months, you know I have a devotion to SYTYCD. And now I'll be able to pick up the phone and vote? How cool is that?! So you can expect more of my "favourite of the night" videos. Tell me, are you going to be watching with me?

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Heard today in the Campeau/Beauregard household:

(Sean is riding my broom around the living room)

Me: Are you a witch (knowing full well he wouldn't know what the word "wizard" meant)

SEAN: No! I'm a cowboy!

(Well, duh!, Mommy. I should've known, the "head" of the broom was in the front, not the back. What was I thinking??)

And another one:

(We've just come back from IGA where the kids got helium-filled balloons. In the house, they let go of them so that they are floating to the ceiling. Sean is entertaining his sister by jumping up to catch the strings)
SEAN: I name's Super Sean to the wescue!!! (no typos, this is how he talks)

(He then jumps up but fails to catch the balloon)

SEAN: Need help please, Super Mommy!

(Finally, someone sees me for what I really am!)

Join me.

Come back in time with me for a minute, wont you? Imagine we are August 17th, at the reception for Noémi's wedding. We are sitting at a table with Erin, her husband Mark, their son Ethan, Eliane, wedding photographers Martine and Dominique, and last but not least, my sweet husband Keith.

Now c'mon, lean in closer. We -as a group- are talking about kids (shocker!) Can you hear what I'm saying? Can you hear me saying how much Kira, my loveable little girlie, is a handful but Sean is a pure angel? Can you hear me say he's been nothing but sweet and I have nothing bad to say about him? Can you?! Now, lean in a little more and please...

*smack me upside the head!!!*

I jinxed it, totally jinxed it.

Oh, he's still sweet. How could he not be? That's Sean: sweet as honey. But for some reason, he's become more, how should I put this?, physical. If he's done with a toy, he'll throw it down on the floor. If something is in his way, he'll kick it. If Nuage (one of our cats) is around, he'll scream to scare him away. Don't get me wrong; he's not violent or enraged. He just does it... because! I'm not sure what he's trying to do, but if it's to get me mad, he's doing it! I've never raised my voice as much as I have in the past week-and-a-half.

-Sean, don't throw your toys on the floor!

-Sean, why did you kick that?!

-Sean, stop scaring Nuage!

-Sean, don't punch the tv!

Anyway.... this is my venting for tonight.

I am leaving you with my most recent layout. I used random pictures of Kira that I liked but that didn't neccessarily deserve their own layout. Then I used a mosaic maker and voila!, I had it printed as is. Yes, the mosaic maker put some pictures off-center, but I like it. It gives it a charm, I think! :D

Layouts

Here is a layout I made a while back when I was scrapping at Erin's. I never posted it in my Scrapbook Centrale gallery because I know some people can easily be offended. But I figure the few people who actually read my blog are cool people and they wont mind the picture (very tasteful IMHO), the subject matter and the words I use in the journaling!! I'm just so proud of my boy!!


And this is Kira in Cuba. It's just so amazing that she has such straight hair but as soon as it's humid, this happens! :)