just to get rid of that last message, huh?  We’re back up and running and looking forward to a NEW MEGAKIT being released tomorrow!  Don’t forget to stop by and check it out!

Well, it’s been up and down today, but since I am unable to get in touch with our host at this moment, I’m taking everything off line because I don’t want to take any chances on data getting lost or anything else of that sort.  Please be assured that I make every decision I make about this kind of thing with my members’ best interests at heart.  I value your layouts and posts even more than I do my own (because I know I have all my layouts backed up to CDs and they’re mine, KWIM?) and do everything I can to ensure the safety of your information.  I’ll update as soon as I know more.

Thanks!

I can’t believe the depth of some peoples’ disrespect for the property of others.  First, this week, a very confidential coupon code was used by someone who should not have had access to it, under an assumed name, to download three of the DSD megakits.  This wasn’t a stranger to our site…this was a member, someone with whom I have had conversations and chats.  I am so sad.  I really can’t believe this person would use the code and the other sad part about this situation is that someone had to give it to her…someone on our team.  And that, honestly, is even more sad.

So, this was yesterday.  Today, up until I left for the day to do some errand running, we were still discussing this issue.  Tonight, when I come home, I have an e-mail from Jen’s Digital Piracy Blog with a list a mile long of digital files that are being shared through RapidShare…yes, one of mine is there.  How sad is this?  I mean, really?  We spend so much time creating this stuff to sell it a handful of times and then have people turn around and distribute it with no respect or regard for the work that was put into it.  Tonight, yet another list has come through.  It truly sickens me and is almost enough to make me want to just stop designing altogether.  Because you can’t control it.  People buy your kits and share them…there’s no way to know who or when or where.  We are fortunate enough to have a few kind souls out there looking out for us, but God only knows how many there are out there passing this stuff around.  It is sad, truly, truly sad.  I can tell you that any time now that I see one of my kits in the gallery and the user name is not a familiar one, I will look at it twice.  But, then, surely the people who would sink to these depths are so shady that they won’t be posting their layouts out there for anyone but their fellow pirates…just so sad.  I think I’ll pull out some paper and scrap now because I just can’t sit here and think about this anymore.  Good night.

I’ve been thinking alot about why I do this, this scrapbooking thing that has taken over so much of my life that some might call it an obsession.  I’ve said so many times that it is about creating lasting memories for my children, telling them things they will want to know in the future, a future where someday, I won’t be around to tell them these things.  For that reason, I have felt compelled to journal, tell them things about the photos or what those photos made me feel, what they were doing and why, how old they were, what they liked, what they didn’t like, anything to let them know a little bit about that particular moment in time because after all, that’s what life is, one long series of moments, right?  So, up to this point, I have almost always tried to put journaling on a layout, to the extent that I was almost bound by the requirement of leaving enough space on my layouts to do that.  I think I thought that perhaps that was some sort of justification for this wonderful artistic release, a way to legitimize the time I spend on this "hobby".  Finally, though, I am seeing this from a different perspective, one that is opening my eyes to the real reason behind what I do and one that is freeing me from those self-imposed restraints that were governing the way I did my layouts.  I came to this realization:  I AM an artist.

I’m not sure why it has taken me so long to recognize that.  I have been doing creative things for years, from playing music to writing to making pretty things.  But somehow, I still never really saw myself as a creative soul, an artist…those things were just things I enjoyed doing, but I never really considered them to be a part of who I am.  I think that our society has placed a tag on art that makes it almost frivolous, a luxury of sorts and that is unfair.  Shouldn’t we embrace our whole selves, whatever they may be?  Shouldn’t we nurture all of the parts of the whole, each little piece of us that makes us who we are?  Why then, is the creative part of our souls so different?  Why is it wrong to give some attention to the artist in us?  Isn’t the artist as important as the Mom?  As the wife?  As the entrepreneur, the business person, the breadwinner, the homemaker?  Whatever our other pieces may be, why is the creative piece of our soul so much less important than the other pieces?  I think it is partially because we are the only ones who really benefit from that artistic release.  No one besides ourselves is relying on us to be creative.  Our children need a Mom, our husbands need a wife, our employees or employers need us to be the business people we may be, our family and home demand our time as a homemaker.  But who needs our creativity besides us?  Who really appreciates it besides ourselves and those other creative souls out there struggling with the same issue that we are?  No one…just us.  I believe that is why this important part of us is so often overlooked, swept under the rug, viewed as a waste of time, a frivolous hobby.  I think that is why so many of us scrapbookers are part of the online communities that we participate in.  We are looking for someone to validate our art, our creativity, because so few of us actually receive that validation at home…what a shame that our family and friends so often fail us in this regard that we have to find our validation in strangers, words on a screen, others who share our struggles with the artistic parts of ourselves.

So, I’ve made a decision.  I am going to not only recognize, but embrace the artist in myself, the creative soul that has been neglected for so long.  I am going to scrapbook what I love.  I am going to make beautiful things and be happy about it, not because I want recognition for it, but because I want to express my creativity in ways that make me happy.  I am going to allow myself to create simply for the sake of creating, without restraining myself to having to journal on every layout.  I am going to allow myself to scrapbook those beautiful photos where there is no reason to scrap them other than the fact that they are beautiful.  I have taken 15 shots of the same thing before, 15 different clicks of my children’s beautiful faces and felt like it wasn’t really okay to scrap them all because, after all, I could only talk about that day or that time or that place on so many pages and so many lines. But each of those 15 clicks was a moment.  A moment to be cherished and recognized and loved and preserved, whether I have something to say about it or not.  So, I suppose, in that regard, I have come full circle and I am back where I started.  Preserving memories for my family.  That is a huge part of why I do this and I will never deny that.  I am proud to be creating a legacy for my children and their children.  But isn’t letting them really know who I am also part of that legacy?  In the photos I take and the words I say, they will all be able to see the outer me, the mom, the wife, the business person, the homemaker.  My endless and powerful love for them is evident in the words and the photos on those pages and that is very important.  But, my true hope is that at least some of them will see the creative side of me in those pages as well, that part that is not so obvious, that cannot be captured simply with photos or words, but that is displayed in every piece of art I create for them.  Because, after all, as much as I am the Mom or the wife or the homemaker, I AM also an artist.  It is a part of me as much as anything else in my life and from this day forward, I will embrace that fact and not need outside validation or justification for what I do.  I will create beautiful things because I want to, because I need to, because it is part of who I am.

I just can’t make up my mind!  I love digital scrapping, I really do.  The simplicity of it suits me.  The digital photos are so easy to manipulate in the computer with the software that I use for my digital layouts. But there is just something about this paper stuff.  I love it.  I am collecting it now and I have to stop.  I think I am overwhelmed at the idea of using it, I just love to buy it and look at it.  Scary, really scary.  I’d love to start doing more paper stuff, even some layouts, just because I think it’s fun to do the hands-on stuff.  But I start looking for photos and I’m overwhelmed.  I am so spoiled to the ease of photo manipulation in digital scrapping that I have such a hard time committing to the photos I want in the size I want.  Then, because I have been digiscrapping for so long, I have very few photos actually printed as photos.  I haven’t been really overly happy with the photos I’ve printed on my home printer, but I think it’s more the paper than the printer.  I need different paper.  I am just so afraid that I am going to get all this great stuff and then get bored with it and want to go back to digital.  Somebody stop me!  I think maybe I’m just burned out a bit on the whole digiscrapping world, but still want to be creative.  Whatever the reason, look for more paper stuff from me, if I can ever get around my issues, LOL.  Meanwhile, I am still enjoying the new Priceless kit and the others…and the new paper stuff I picked up today at Hobby Lobby !

Go grab it if you haven’t already; the Priceless Kit!

in the Digiscrapdivas store now (click on image to go there)!  A whopper of a bargain at $8.50 and ALL proceeds go to the Kids with Cancer charity!

More to come throughout the evening so please check back.  I’ll be showing off our Priceless Kit as well as the Karma Chameleon kit by the Sugar Babes at Sweet Shoppe Designs, for which all proceeds from sales tomorrow also go to the Kids with Cancer Society.  Here’s Happy People:

One more, Being Boys…

Here’s one with the Karma Chameleon kit, Smiling Eyes:

I’ll be editing this thread and adding more photos all evening so please check back and come to our fabulous event tomorrow!

Coming Wednesday to Digiscrapdivas:

Click here for more details!

a better blogger, but then I go weeks with no post.  I guess there are just more important things taking precedence or I feel like I have nothing interesting to post.  But, again, I say I’ll try to do better, so we’ll see.

Got a facelift for the blog.  As much as I think the name "Meanwhile, back at the ranch" is cool, I just never talk about the ranch much so I am trying out a new name.  A new banner, too…very simple and minimalist, just my style.

I haven’t done alot of scrapping lately, seem to have been in a rut, but I did do a two pager yesterday that I want to show off.  This is with the Relaxed Kit on the new Express Yourself CD from Ashley Olson and Dawn Stocstill.

page 1:

page 2:

Look at those sweet babies!  I can’t believe how quickly they grow.  You hear it all the time, but it is so true.  My baby girl wrote her name last night!  I wrote it for her and she copied it.  The cool part is that she wrote it in a journal that I had altered and decided to use to write in about them so it couldn’t be in a more perfect place.

Speaking of baby girl, bless her heart, she is sick.  She coughed all night.  I actually was up late and didn’t get to bed ’til about 1:30, but then she started coughing and just didn’t stop.  I didn’t really think it was time for another dose of medicine but I did get up and put a Triaminic Vapor Patch on her.  It helped a little, I guess.  This morning, though, she’s still coughing.  We are supposed to be going to a birthday party this afternoon, but I am not sure if I’ll take her or not.  First, she doesn’t feel good and second, if she has something contagious, I hate to spread it around…aarrgh. 

I’ve you’ve been to DSD in the last day or so, you’ll notice that I pared down the forums substantially, hoping to make them easier to navigate.  You might also have seen a post from me about making a little birthday album for this party.  I did, finished it last last night (well, actually early this morning) and I like it.  It is very clean, not many embies, no inking, just simple pages with printed on text, using the Arctic Frog Spring Break collection (Alannah’s, not mine, but a great BOY collection).  I’ll post some pics later when I have enough natural light through my window to take some good ones.

Well, baby girl is still coughing so I’m off to get her some medicine and refill my coffee.

Be a better blogger…that’s my new motto .

Have a great day!