Treasure

I spent two solid hours in the basement last night looking at Eric's old things. He never threw anything away. He kept everything, including empty boxes and paperwork from years ago. I remember asking Eric to throw some of his stuff away. There was so much of it and I was overwhelmed by it all. He was of course attached to the many things he kept. He thought it was wasteful to throw perfectly good objects away for the sake of cleanliness. Looking back, I'm glad he didn't listen to me. His entire history is sitting in our basement. I started going through it last night and came across some old photos from his childhood. I'd never seen the photos before and was happily surprised to have found them tucked away under a stack of various other things. I looked at all of them. He was passionate about the great outdoors. He grew up around camping and portages. Most of the photos were of gorgeous sunsets, trees, clouds, mountains, and lakes. I did find a small mini album of old family photos. I came across the above photos in the mini album. They literally took my breath away. My first immediate reaction was, "oh my gosh, he looks exactly like Ethan." My two boys are almost identical. I was sort of aware of this, but it wasn't until I saw these photos that I realized just how similar the two of them look, especially as toddlers. I put all three photos on display in my kitchen. I can't bare to put them away. I can hardly wait to share them with Ethan when he gets older. He'll also have an opportunity to see everything else that dad didn't throw away. I guess some things are worth keeping, even empty boxes.

I'm back on board at Studio Calico as a designer. I had taken a small leave of absence during the last phase of Eric's battle against brain cancer. I've been working with February's kit. I'm working on three layouts using this kit. I've posted a few sneak peeks above from two of the layouts. I'll post the actual layouts after January 28th (the day of the reveal-February's kit).

I will be designing for Prima Marketing Inc. over the next twelve months. I have to say it's a true honor to design for Prima Marketing. I never thought in a million years I would hold a spot on their team. I'm thrilled to be a part of their community. Thank you Prima for providing me this opportunity. Congrats to the rest of the new team members below:

Adrienne Looman
Amy Hutchinson
Celeste Smith
Celine Navarro (France)
Christine Middlecamp
Cindy Tobey
Iris Babao-Uy (The Philippines)
Janine Langer (Germany)
Janine Wahl
Mara-May Baca
Nura Keif (Singapore)
Stephanie Howell

Off to try and get some sleep this evening. Ethan was up four times last night and the night before that he slept for only a total of four hours. I'm one tired mom. Here's to hoping for a good night's rest.