The Meme...

Well, to distract you from the fact that I have no knitting news, I am going to share a meme with you...again! LOL I'm exhausted after a week visit with my Aunt, a day trip with her and the kids and I have been having some pain/?arthritis in my finger joints. I'm too tired physically, mentally and emotionally to knit! How can that be? I don't know but it does happen. Maybe over the next week I will share some photos of our trip to see the Sierrra Redwood trees (Giant Sequoias) at Big Trees State Park in Arnold, California. Pictures never quite do them justice but they are amazing! There is literally nothing like them in the world.

So, the meme...for which I have noone to tag because I am probably the last blogger in the world to do this. Amy...have you done this? If not, you are tagged!

Here’s how to play…
1. Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged write a blog post about their own 8 random things and post these rules.
3. At the end of your blog you need to tag 8 people and post their names.

Eight Random Things

1. If you looked at my house you would see lots of clutter...it's too small, I have too much stuff, there's nowhere to put it. In actuality I am a very good organizer and some things I organize obsessively. I think that I would be a good professional organizer because I could understand the messy person, the space challenged and the creative disarray, but I could also see how to do things better. My Grandma Hopkins always said she was "not a perfectionist, just an efficiency expert." I often organize things so that they can be used more efficiently and like to color code things that get stored. Also when I clean I can't just shove stuff anywhere, like in "Fibber McGee's Closet" (unless there is surprise company! LOL), I have to start in one spot and have it perfect and then move on. My husband has mild ADD...can you imagine how I drive him crazy! :o)

2. I have always been interested in "old fashioned" things. As a child I was often found sitting with the older women, listening. I have never felt comfortable with people my own age because to them I was boring and weird. I loved my Grandma Johnson's stories about growing up in the depression and my Grandma Hopkins nourished my desire to learn about different things like cooking, sewing, crochet, art etc.

3. Photography is a passion for me. Sometimes my shots come out great...sometimes not so much. I have only taken one photography course and I didn't learn much in it other than developing (which I can't remember...except for how hard it was to wind the film on those metal coil things without ruining it by having it touch!). My Grandpa Johnson taught me a bit but mostly I learned how to "see" and compose from my Aunt Grace who is an oil painting Artist, photographer and an art teacher. However, my best shots are created from the deep passion within me that aches and longs to share the beauty and awesome wonder and mystery of all of God's Creation so that others will know Him too!

4. No big surprise...I love to scrapbook, though I rarely have time. I especially love heritage scrapbooking which combines several of my interests. I used to teach heritage scrapbooking classes and I am currently designing a class on sharing your faith through scrapbooking, art and journaling. I don't know if I will ever get to teach it but I am having fun thinking about all the things to include and hope this summer to work on some projects for it. I also hope to learn how to do digital scrapbooking.

5. I love to write and have had penpals since I was in middle school...from England, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Ireland, Africa, California, Canada...but the ultimate penpal was my hubby who started out as an email penpal in 1996!

6. Many doctors told me I would never have children...now I have oodles...well, okay, 3, but they feel like oodles when you are 40 and have a 5 yo and two 4 yos! LOL DS was conceived on fertility treatments. Fertility treatments are not fun on many levels. The twin girls...well they were a gift from God...a surprise "flu" that just wouldn't go away! :o) And man, those two little girls have the energy and mischievousness of four little boys! When they were born four years ago I had very dark brown, almost black hair...now it is salt and pepper, heavy on the salt! In spite of all the hard work they are a testimony to me of God's faithfulness and working in my life.

7. Spending time at the ocean rejuvenates my soul. It seems to be the only place that I actually *physically* relax. I hate living so far away from the ocean after growing up in Washington State rarely more than 30 minutes from some kind of a beach.

8. Like most Americans I am a Heinz 57 mix, but when it's all put together I am mainly Irish, Scots-Irish and English. There is a large chunk of Swede with smidgeons of German, Polish and Slovakian thrown in. My greatest genealogical road block has been the Slovakian family...Dipko. The most genealogy data I have is on the Hopkins/Wolcott families, but probably the most rewarding families to research were the Johnson/Landgren, Larimore and Tisdale because I started with virtually nothing and ended up with cousins all over the US and Canada and many pictures that I never knew existed.

There you go...8 more things about me that you probably didn't even want to know! LOL Anyone else game to try? Tell me in the comments and I will go learn about you!