my Thanksgiving lens

this year celebrating Thanksgiving included traveling to atlanta to be with mark's family. while distance may separate us, the relationships we've built make it feel like no time has passed when we're together again. and getting these four cousins together is pure joy.

these were a few of our highlights:

we all arrived with excitement and anticipation in our hearts.

we ate awesome meals and feasted on lots of sweet treats including our tradition of pilgrim pies.
uncle mark did another outstanding job creating a personalized ornament for each one.
michelle and sally served both ham and turkey.
the four cousins played until they dropped.
temperatures were in the mid 60's, but the fireplace was always burning.
the trampoline was a huge hit.
and the four of them were good sports about letting me take photo after photo trying to get the "perfect" shot.
some of us celebrated a michigan win and then later that night a south carolina win.
we started what would be a fourteen hour drive home with this bright spot.
being with family is always the best place to be.

scrapbook on the road

"finish Germany journal" has been on my "do-list" for weeks, and I've been completely avoiding it. perfection and a perceived lack of time settled in and paralyzed my progress until...

spencer planned a 'guy's Psych marathon" for saturday, which gave mom a few hours of creative time. over the past few weeks, I've been focusing on finishing the projects I have in progress instead of starting new. this project could be avoided no more!

in preparing for our trip to Germany, I knew that I wanted to have a documenting journal with me, but just wasn't sure how to put it all together. so before mark and I left, I purchased Ali Edwards' "Scrapbook on the Road" self paced class to gain inspiration from a scrapbooker whose I style I admire.

ali's approach of making the scrapbook a visual and emotional experience was just what I wanted. my goal was not to create a picture album but more of a visual written journal, so I could step out of my comfort zone and share my observations and experiences with words, not only photos. the photos are comfortable; the words are more of a challenge.

because mark and I were going to create an iphoto book of the trip when we returned, I wasn't concerned that this "scrapbook" be archivaly safe. I simply wanted a journal full of honest, moment by moment experiences with lots of local documentation added in. Ali's class helped me create just what I wanted.

finishing this project turned out to be the least rewarding thing about it. each physical item affixed stirred an emotional memory. it was like being there all over again. I learned so much about myself during our Germany trip. reading back over my unfiltered thoughts reminded me of the little joys, struggles and moments that I might too soon forget. if it were not, that is, for my finished Germany visual journal.

my {traveling} weekend lens

:: relaxing ::

:: awesome desserts ::

:: sharing recipes ::

:: remembering with slides ::

:: park fun ::

:: togetherness ::

:: family ::

:: bocce ::

many thanks to aunt linda and uncle rich

for a weekend full of moments to remember!