Taking chances

Some of you are going to laugh at me because of this post.  That’s okay with me.  Something you should know about me is that I have a terrible habit of doubting myself.  In almost every area of my life I find it easy to second guess my decisions.  Especially when they involve spending large amounts of money.

Because of this little problem of mine my house has been at a standstill as far as decorating goes.  When we moved in eleven years ago I had big plans.  Unfortunately I didn’t have the funds to go with my big plans.  Over time I have just gotten used to the lack of style my house has, but I always wish it had more style.  The problem is that having style costs money and means taking chances—chances that you might take the time and money to do something that you think will be awesome except then once you do it, it isn’t.  This is where I’ve been for the past few years.  Paralyzed by the fear that whatever I decide to do I will hate.  So, I find reasons to not do anything—I plan, I research, I search for the perfect thing—only I usually never find the perfect thing for the perfect price and then I give up. 

One of the resolutions I made this year was to take chances, make mistakes and be okay with it and to quit procrastinating.  Admittedly, I started small, but you’ve gotta start somewhere don’t you?  I’ve wanted to do a cool picture collage in my house for a long time.  We got some awesome family pictures taken a few months ago and I have been dreaming ever since of how I could put them on the wall in an awesome display.  So, I started drawing out some ideas…they seemed ok on paper, but it was all honestly overwhelming to figure out what frames to buy and what pictures to buy and how it would all fit together on the wall.  I found tons of inspiration on pinterest and a few tips to help me out with my planning.  My awesome husband knew that I wanted to do it so he bought me a kit for Christmas.  It looked like this:I really liked the frames, but the tree thing just wasn’t part of my vision.  So, I used the frames as a jumping off point along with the fact that I knew I wanted a big print of my whole family as part of it.  Once I had a better idea of what sizes the frames were I cut a bunch out of graph paper so they were to scale and then I used another piece of graph paper to give the guidelines of the space I had to fill and I tried all kinds of different configurations on paper to see what I liked.  (I didn’t take pictures of this part, but here are the tools used)I cut out a few more frames than I had in several different sizes so I could get a better idea of what frames I still needed to buy.  Emily loved helping me with this part too.  When we’d find a configuration that we liked we would sketch it out on a piece of paper so we could remember it later.  Here is one of the papers we used to sketch ideas on. 

Once I had all the frames we set it all up how we liked it best and then we searched our pictures to figure out which ones we wanted to use in the collage.  The problem was, that we didn’t take into consideration which orientation the pictures we had that we liked were in so we had to go back to the drawing board a little bit after we chose pictures.  (Thanks to Segi and Tami for their suggestions on this part!)

Once we had the pictures and the general idea of how we wanted the frames we laid everything out on the floor to get a sense of the spacing and everything. 

We made paper patterns of all the frames so we would know the exact dimensions and to help us get the hangers in all the right places and we taped them up on the wall.  This is where I got the anxiety about making so many holes in the wall and had to cross my fingers and force myself to take the plunge and just do it!  (have a good laugh at me now)

Finally done!  I LOVE IT!So, there you have it.  I finally stuck my little toe into the water and hopefully I’ll be able to plunge the rest of the way in soon!  Actually, I’m being forced to because we are re-doing our basement shower and tiling the whole thing.  Let me tell you the anxiety I’m feeling over this one…it’s huge!  It’s so expensive and so PERMANENT!  Hopefully I can do it!  Wish me luck!

Are you a risk taker or a worrier like me? 

Going back to Cali

Remember a few months ago when I blogged about visiting California to see my Grandma?  Well, I went back, but this time for her funeral.  I’ve been wanting to blog about it, but just haven’t been able to find the right words for my feelings about the whole thing.  I still don’t have the right words, but I need to write some things down so I can remember them before I’ve forgotten.  I loved my Grandma and will miss her so much.  She was such an amazing woman and I hope that I can be a little bit like her by the time I have to leave this earth.  This is from when I went to visit in September.

Christmas at Temple square in 2004She came to visit in November of 2008 and we were lucky enough to have her at our house a few of the days she was in Utah.

This is when she first met Liam (I think)

I miss her so much.  Every time Emily plays the songs that Grandma taught her on the piano it reminds me of her.  One thing I’m grateful for is my knowledge that I will see her again someday and that she’s now reunited with her husband and parents. 

Now a few highlights from the few days I was in California. For some reason all these pictures are in reverse order so we’ll go backwards since I’m too lazy to move them all around.

Her funeral services were beautiful with lots of music just like she would have wanted.  I couldn’t seem to make my voice work to sing most of the time, but I tried my hardest to sing as much as I can because that’s what Grams would have wanted. 

This is at the cemetery before they dedicated the grave.  After the dedication we all said our final goodbyes and then we took a few pictures.  All the kids with Grandpa’s sister, Carol.

After the funeral there was an open house at my Grandma’s house for anyone that wanted to come.  It was mostly family and close family friends, but it was nice to sit and remember her with others that loved her too.  Of course we had to take a few pictures.  All the family together. (we were all exhausted by this time)

The girl cousins.Siblings.  This was the first time I’ve seen my brother Tom in just over four years.  I miss him.Me and KathiAll of my immediate family that was there. 

My brother was awesome enough to pick me up from the San Francisco airport so that I didn’t have to take a shuttle.  It was super nice to get to catch up with him and meet his new wife.  They got married in November so this was a baptism by fire thing for her to meet so much family all at once.  She was a champ and fit right in to our crazy bunch.  She’s awesome and didn’t mind me talking my brother’s ear off during the drive either.  She insisted I sit in front with him which I truly appreciated.  On our way through SF Tom told me that one of our cousins on the other side of the family lived and worked in SF so we called him to see if we could stop by to see him.  Thankfully his work is kind enough not to mind us bugging him. 

This is my cousin Jason.  I don’t think I’ve seen him since I was a teenager.  He was super nice and the chocolate at his store is REALLY REALLY good!  I ate it really slowly to savor every little bit I could. 

We stayed so long visiting Jason that we ended up in rush hour traffic going North to Cotati, but it made it easier to take pictures.  That’s the best I could do of Alcatraz while we were driving and through the fog too.  The golden gate bridge…that was the nicest view we had the whole drive.  The rest of it was just lots and lots of cars and some vineyards when we were lucky.  At least I was in good company while we drove and my brother is a seasoned driver so I didn’t have to worry at all.  There you go.  My trip back to Cali.  It’s still so strange to think that nothing will be the same next time I go there. 

A huge thank you and tons of love to my husband, Jason for holding down the fort while I was gone.  Also, to my neighbor Tami and my sister in law Heather for watching Liam when Jason had to give a presentation at work while I was gone.  I really have the best family ever!

Christmas concerts, programs, and tree

Our Christmas tree this year.  We usually wind the ribbon around the tree like garland, but this year we tried something new and we really liked it (even though it took forever to figure out).  What do you think?

?Everyone wants to do a Christmas concert and since my kids are both in musical groups we spent a good amount of time attending their performances.  That’s Em above playing clarinet in the intermediate band.

Liam wanted a picture of himself at the concert.  We were there a little bit early so he was being goofy playing with my sunglasses.  The concert was great!

Jason is in a choral group at school called vocal premier.  They performed at the mall one week so Liam and I went to listen and then took Jason to lunch at Chick-fil-a.  It was nice to spend some time with Jason.

Liam’s preschool had a cute little program the last day of classes.  While they were singing Santa Claus is coming to town Santa actually came to preschool!  It was funny watching all the awestruck kids trying to keep singing.  Liam wouldn’t sit on his lap, but he did stand by him and tell him he wanted Captain America toys.  Thankfully Santa came through on that one.  Even though they had already performed at the mall, the choir still had a Christmas concert at the school.  Coincidentally it was scheduled the exact same night and time as the Orchestra concert which meant that Jason had a busy night and had to miss the last number at his Choir concert so he could make it to the orchestra one.  Hopefully the teachers will coordinate better with each other in the Spring. 

Too bad Jason has to be way in the back where it is really hard to get a picture of him.  He plays in the advanced orchestra and their concert was great!  We enjoyed listening to their improving talents.

Playing catch up

I’ve been sadly lacking in my blogging lately—sorry about that.  I could give you a bunch of excuses, but they are still just excuses.  Mostly I just didn’t feel like blogging and wanted to enjoy being with my family celebrating the holidays and having fun together.  Lots of stuff happened in December so hopefully I can at least blog the high points and low points if nothing else.  Stay tuned