2010 in 100 pages or less

According to Hallmark, Victoria's Secret, and various jewelry and candy stores, Valentine's Day equals flowers, chocolates, and romantic tokens of everlasting love. Let's be honest, that is not the Valentine's Day that we celebrate in my house. And, I'm betting if you've been married a while or have kids, your Valentine's Days probably more resemble mine than the media-sponsored romance-fest kind. I'll admit it, this year, I went to Walgreen's on February 13th to pick out favors to take to Molly's preschool. While there, I picked up a hat and Kit Kat for Cory. It sounds awful, I know, but to be fair, he loves Kit Kats, and the baseball hat actually fit his head really well, which is quite a feat for his small head. Anyway, my romantic, heartfelt gift from Cory was (drumroll, please)



an external hard drive and a laptop cooling pad. Jealous? I know you are.




Now, the thing is, I was really excited by my external hard drive and my laptop cooling pad. Here's why: I have, in the last couple years, become a digital scrapbooker. I used to be all about traditional: cutting paper and gluing and stickers. But, then, I took a class from a friend and became a convert. I do it all on my laptop. While I'm sitting on my couch. The clean-up? Closing the screen on my laptop. I think that was the biggest draw to digital scrapbooking. I can do it whenever I have a minute and don't have to worry about picking up an infinite amount of tiny paper scraps afterwards. (Side note: when I was pregnant with Charlotte, scrapbooking became my "nesting." I absolutely had to get caught up before she was born otherwise my whole life would fall apart. Of that, my preggers brain was convinced, don't ask me why!)

One small drawback to doing it on the computer: sometimes computers crash. That is exactly what prompted my Valentine's gift. While working on some scrapbooking (trying to meet a deadline for a good deal at Shutterfly), my laptop overheated while on my lap. When I restarted it, it corrupted my external hard drive, which housed ALL my scrapbooking, and I lost EVERYTHING! I was heartbroken and, frankly, pissed. Cory worked really hard to try to recover some stuff, and he did get some things back, but some are lost forever. (Tear slowly trickling down cheek.)

So, even after that, I had to keep working, because I had to make another Shutterfly deadline (50 percent off a 12x12 book!). I just worked and prayed my computer didn't crash and force me to start all over yet again. I felt as if it were a ticking time bomb, waiting until the worst possible moment to blow. Luckily, I finished my book before any massive catastrophe occurred, and then I received my oh-so-romantic Valentine's gift. You can see now why a laptop cooling pad and external hard drive would make me happy. Let's hope they ensure that my work is never again lost to the evil monsters that live inside my computer. (I swear they are there, even if Cory swears they aren't.)

I'll admit, this posting probably had a limited audience pool, and I'm sure I lost people when the word 'scrapbooking' came out (and talking about Valentine's Day in March probably didn't help). But, I was so excited, I had to share. Because, while checking the mail on Sunday, (Yes, I know we don't get mail on Sunday, but we go days and days without checking the mail sometimes. Especially in the winter with snow on the ground!) I practically did a jig out in the street. Inside my mailbox sat my scrapbook from 2010.

All of this long, rambling post to tell you that I now have my entire last year compiled into 100 pages of shiny paper goodness. While I have shared the link above, please don't criticize any of my work. I just had to finish, and although I could've sworn we took fewer pictures in 2010, it appears that wasn't the case, so there are a lot of pictures stuffed into those pages. Also, there was no time for proofing, so it is possible things are incorrect. (Gasp!) Again, don't judge. Be happy. I am. I am caught up. Well, except that now it is March, and I haven't even touched anything from 2011 ...

Showing Molly and Charlotte the new book. They loved looking at pictures of themselves. And, yes, Molly does have a band-aid on her nose. Please, don't ask and don't judge.