Sunday, February 27, 2011

Dabbling in Digital!

In December, right before Christmas, the Scanlon family....two grandparents, four siblings, four spouses, six cousins and one fiance....were treated to the vacation of a lifetime!! The two grandparents invited all of us to a stunning resort on the Mayan Riviera, near Cancun in Mexico. We were dazzled by the beautiful scenery, treated to an endless array of food and drink, warmed by the hot sun and blessed with hours of time to spend with each other. I was excited to get home, gather everyone's pictures and get to work learning how to work with digital software. I wanted to make something that I could send to Brian's parents that would let them know how grateful we were for their generous gift and their dedication to family ~ their years of love, support and hard work have profoundly influenced all of us.
 
Got to use a photo for the background of this page, and then sneak some more pics of pool fun into the mix!

...that appear side by side.

Very easy to coordinate pages...

One of the best part of the vacation was getting to see all the kids enjoy their time together. These kids have put up with lots of cameras over the years...all the parents and grandparents enjoy pictures! Since we are usually only together once a year, we try hard to take a photo of the six cousins each time. These "cousin pictures" are among my favorite photos of  all of my photos. This trip was no exception to the cousin phtoto rule!

Posing on one of the many bridges that were built over the pools...they take a smily photo and a silly photo. No question that they enjoy making faces more than smiling!
Just look how beautiful this place is!!
To look through the whole book, follow this link:

Saturday, February 26, 2011

The Mundane and The Milestones



Our little rental. Four cars crammed into the driveway. And all the moments that make up a year. Some of the moments are mundane. Lazy. Ordinary. To spice up the mundane our lives are seasoned with milestone moments ~ birthdays, moves, trips, visitors, holidays ~ events that we prepare for and remember....even without the help of a scrapbook. I started my current project last November ~ to capture as many moments as possible from this year that's leading up to my daughter's wedding. Engaged last August, she moved 'home' the first week of November, giving us one last year as a family of four ... living under the same roof. These are precious "minutes" and I'm taking even more photos than I usually do, trying to stop time ~ or, at least, slow it down a little bit!

The first major milestone of this wonderful year, you ask? I turned 50!! While there were several celebrations throughout the week ~ the day itself was filled with friends, sunflowers, family and one 'freak me out' surprise!! After feeling remembered and loved all day long, I got home after work to find that my brother had travelled from Hawaii to surprise me! As soon as I walked through the door and saw the top of his head leaning on the side of the couch, I knew my family had helped him to organize the best gift ever!



There have been hundreds of mundane moments ~ taco nights, our favorite TV nights...so typical to see the four of us with our laptops and/or phones lounging around for the evening while "watching" shows and making jokes. So whether it's watching football as one of the many blizzards of the year begins, or having dinner after a first day on the job ~ it's the day to day interaction of our family that makes our little rental house a home. And it's capturing and recording all these memories that brings me back to blogging about my life as a scrapbooker!