Challenge #54: Flowers, Flowers Everywhere

Spring is coming! Spring is coming! Ok, so maybe not for a few more months, but we can get excited for it early, right?? This week's challenge at Scrap Whispers is to get you in the "springy" kind of mood. Create a layout with flowers, flowers, flowers!

Here's my layout:

Challenge #53: The Write Stuff

Journaling! This week's Scrap Whispers challenge is all about journaling. Tell us a story about the photo.

Here's my take on the challenge:

"Still Alice"

"Still Alice" by Lisa Genova---**** (4 stars)
Harvard professor, Alice Howland, is a leader in the psychology field. She travels all over the world delivering speeches for thousands of professionals. She has three grown successful children and a brilliant biologist husband. Her life was perfect is almost every way. Then one day while out for a typical jog around the neighborhood, she found herself lost and disoriented. She also finds herself forgetting words and small little things everyday. She visits her doctor and finds something she had never expected.

This book takes you through a journey of a women in her early 50's experiencing early-onset Alzheimer's disease. Having a loved one dealing with the disease in my own life, this book really touched home for me. The book was very well written in the perspective of Alice. Watching her deteriorate throughout the book was almost more than I could handle. I found myself extremely overwhelmed with emotion several times. A definite must read!

Challenge #52: Watermelon

Everyone has the winter blah's. I don't know about you, but I'm already looking forward to warm summer days again! This week's Scrap Whispers challenge is the spark that we need to get us through the cold winter nights. This week it's all about WATERMELON! Use the watermelon as your inspiration---colors, smell, summer days--whatever "the watermelon" tells you to create!

Here's my take using red, black, and green as my inspiration:

"Summer Island"

I finished another book!!! After reading "Those Who Save Us", I decided to read a lighter, easier read. My friend had loaned me the book "Summer Island" by Kristin Hannah. This past fall I read "Firefly Lane" by the same author and loved it. I thought I'd give it shot!


"Summer Island" by Kristin Hannah--*** (3 stars)
This story starts out with a mom and a daughter. Nora, the mother, is living the high life as a successful radio and newspaper advice columnist. She is loved nationwide! Meanwhile her daughter Ruby struggles day-to-day as a comedian/waitress in Hollywood. An ugly divorce in Ruby's teens had separated mother and daughter long ago. A scandal is unleashed on Nora and sends them both back to their cottage retreat on "Summer Island", forcing them to face issues that were buried deep in the many years that separated them.

Love, family, heartache, forgiveness, and death are just a few issues dealt with in this book. It really made me stop and look at just how important my family is--no matter what struggles they have been through. While I never really felt a deep connection with any character in the book, it keep me interested and turning the pages. As with other Hannah books I could sense what was about to happen, but not exactly. It left me with a positive feeling, something that makes you feel happy after you read a good book. I look forward to reading many more books by Kristin Hannah!

Challenge #51: Turquoise and Purple

Another week, another challenge! This week was truly a challenge for me. I am not a big fan of the color purple. I rarely use it in layouts. This weeks challenge at Scrap Whispers is to create a layout (or card) using the colors turquoise and purple. I found the perfect photos and patterned paper for the challenge. It magically went together really easily! They are really fun colors to use together. Stop over to the Scrap Whispers blog and submit your turquoise and purple layout for a chance to win a prize!!!

"Those Who Save Us"

In 2009 I got back into a long time hobby of reading again. I've even joined with a few friends and started a book club! I'm finding it so relaxing at night to wind down with a book. Prior to kids, I was mostly a mystery book reader---Grisham, Patterson, etc. But, now I'm really trying to push myself to read ALL types of books. I've found that I really enjoy reading historical fiction books. Usually these books take me much longer to read, but it's made me to want to learn more about different events/people in history (I've never been a history buff, so it's all new to me!).

While I'm not really good at writing reviews, I'm going to attempt to give a brief synopsis of each book I read this year. I'll rank each book on a 1-4 scale with 4 being the highest rating. This is a great way to keep track of the books I've read and give others some book suggestions. So here it goes, my first book of the year........

"Those Who Save Us" by Jenna Blum--*** (3 stars)
I decided to start off the year with a historical fiction book centered around WWII in Germany. This book was written in the prospective of two women growing up in Germany during WWII. It switches back and forth throughout the book from present day and early 1940's. The 1940's portion of the book travels through the war with Anne, a German girl in her late teens and early 20's. Anne endures some very VERY troublesome times trying to raise her daughter alone amist the war. She does whatever she can to ensure her daughters safety and survival. On the flip side we experience the present day, Trudy, Anne's daughter who despretely yearns to learn about her past.

While many parts of this book were difficult to read, because of the nature of the content, I found it very interesting to read about this time period from a women's prospctive---especially a German women's prospective. I can't even imagine going through any of it and surviving. A very powerful book. I would definitley recommend it to all women.

Challenge #50: Stars and Spikes

The Scrap Whispers challenges are BACK!!!!! I am so excited. Mostly to inspire me to get back into my scrapbooking. I haven't scraped anything in soooooo long! First I need to clean off my desk (which has been a dumping spot lately for anything and everything!).

Our first challenge for the new year is a fun one. This week's challenge is to create a layout using "stars & spikes". Spikes?? Interpret whatever way you wish! There are so many different directions you could take with it.

Since Adam is my little sports star AND his football shoes have spikes, here's what I created:

Make sure to stop over to the Scrap Whispers blog and forum. We are getting ready to start our new round of the "whisper". If you would like to play----stop in and sign up. You are only committed to completing one layout to play. Super, super fun and easy!