Darcy Scraps

I love Halloween! Last night we started celebrating with pumpkin cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory while we watched It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Tonight I am expecting lots of trick or treaters. We have lots of decorations up and tons of jack-o-lanterns. I am so ready for Halloween! Plus, I got a treat in the mail...my December CK has arrived at last :)

Do you know this song from the film version of Evita?
Where do we go from here?
This isn't where we intended to be.

I was shopping at Lush this weekend and admitted to the sales lady that I had gone a little overboard with my splurge. She said something to the effect that it was a good thing that I loved myself and took the time for self-care. I've really thought a lot about this remark this weekend. Last night we invited friends over for pumpkin carving. DH is very fond of the intricate pumpkin patterns! Looking around the table...One of our friends has a serious illness and I got to thinking about how much time she has to devote to self-care just to manage her illness. In contrast we have another friend who is slacking so badly in the self-care department she has literally made herself ill. Her doctor has advised minor lifestyle changes, but she wont put forth the effort. So where do I fit in on the self-care scale?

Sadly, I'm tipping the slacker end. I fight fatigue almost constantly. I eat healthy foods, but I make no time for exercise. I am at the heaviest weight of my lifetime. My doctor says my weight is still healthy but I am unhappy with my figure. I have had to stop wearing some of my favorite clothes. The doctor also tells me that getting in exercise will help the fatigue (she believes it is mostly stress induced) but I can't seem to get moving. By the time I get home from work, I am so drained I just want to veg out.

But the reality is I am letting go of the things I like best and the things that define who I am. I haven't made a layout in two weeks. I've hardly read anything for fun. My garden is in serious need of attention and I can't remember preparing a meal in the last month. I've even had my DH walk the dogs alone because I am feeling so lazy.

So today I am beginning a journey...a journey back to the person I want to be... a journey I want to document in an art journal. I'm excited about creating this journal of inspiration and goals. I'm not sure how to begin! Please share your art journal ideas with me.

I am still feeling sick from yesterday, but I will not dwell on it. I will move on and continue to honor and celebrate the friend who was taken from me. Someday I want to scrapbook this, but right now I can't imagine how. I'm saving the newspaper clippings and I have a ton of high school photos. I'm guessing the best way to work with the newspaper is to have copies made? Any suggestions?

As an adult, I recognize that loss is part of life. Remember when you were young and you didn't really believe that terrible things could happen to you? Remember in high school how you believed you and your friends would stay close forever?

I went to a small school with just one hundred people in my graduating class. We were a tightly knit group. Some of us were closer than others, but I don't remember any "Mean Girls" type stuff. Our graduation was held in June of 1990 and we all went off in different directions for college. It was the end of August, for most of us the first week of our collge classes, when we got the terrible news. Our beloved classmate Christi had been the victim of the Gainesville serial killer. In just three days this man had brutally murdered 5 people.

Today this killer is sentenced to die. After 16 years of waiting for justice, we will finally see the lethal injection administered at six o'clock this evening. I am not going to the prison. I am going back to my old school. While the media focuses on the killer, I will be back at school where my memories are vivid and bright. I will focus on Christi and her love for life. I will tell about our time together and the fun we had. I will look through old pictures and yearn for the simple joys we took for granted. I will collect the stories and some day they will go into my scrapbook, where Christi will forever be a 17 year old girl, filled with promise and excited about her future.

Hello friends! I am so happy to be back here to blog :) To satisfy the curious, here is a brief bit about where I've been:

I don't post much about my job, but I work pretty hard. I average at least 50 hours in the office a week. I have two assistants who work fulltime. One of my assistants got married and moved away. Every attempt I've made to hire a replacement has been a disaster. I had one new hire who only lasted a day! My second assistant was really struggling and finally walked out without notice. I hired a temp to cover the basics but she called in sick! I was already covering for my boss who was out of the country on vacation so in the end I was working four fulltime positions. I don't even want to think about the number of hours I've put in this month.

The good news is that my boss has been very supportive and appreciative during all of this. I have hired one new staff member and I am interviewing for my second assistant position this week. I've had to pull some very important projects off my to do list until I can complete the training of our new hires so the rest of the year will be long hours and challenges. The thing is I work for a great lady and in a great place so I am not gonna let extra work get me down. The autonomy and the respect I have here are worth it.

In the next week or so I hope to be able to get to a 60 hour week. I am also limiting myself to 5 days a week so I can reserve weekends for my husband, my friends and scrapbooking. I am even taking a couple of days off in December to attend a special event at Disney with my husband. Life is coming back into balance.

Thanks to all of you who stuck with this blog. I've missed reading the Two Peas board and your blogs, but I am catching up as I take breaks from work for some me time. I can't wait to get back to scrapbooking!

Oh where, oh where has Darcy Blogger gone? Did she fall into a black hole on the internet? Did she escape to Disney World never to return? No. In fact, I have simply been so caught up with stuff from my day job that I have had to put blogging on hold. Fear not faithful readers; I shall return!