"Write the bad things that are done to you in the sand, but the good things: Scrap them!" (My rendition of an Arabic proverb)

All the reports about what a nasty job sanding drywall mud is were definitely NOT exaggerated.

Fortunately, I had enough of an inkling of what was to follow that I made sure to do it while my kids were napping. I closed all the doors possible to close. (Okay, I didn't close the guest room door downstairs--sorry, Dad. But that's pretty far away. I hope it is mostly unaffected.)

The actual sanding part was easy:

1. Wrap the little sanding screen around the piece of styrofoam I've recycled as a sanding block.

2. Rub back and forth vigorously.

3. Watch a white cloud begin to billow from my work area, settling on every available surface in my house, and in every pore and orifice of my body. (And the house was oh-so-spotless before, too! Dang!)

I am sure I will be cleaning drywall dust out of crevices for weeks years. Thank goodness I am only doing an itty-bitty pass-through window, and not an entire house! Yikes! The very thought makes me twitch! (Twitch is a fun word, don't you think? Go ahead, say it out loud: "Twitch!" If you are in public, you should now look up and smile and wave at those people who are looking at you as if you have a helium balloon for a brain.)

However, at supper my hubby brought me home a package that came in the mail, containing these:

These are my two new albums from KI Memories. (Actually, I bought these for a wonderful discount on eBay. I love eBay.) These are the third and fourth albums I've gotten from them--the first was Jabin's baby album, in the "Water" barcode design. Then I got our 2003 family album in "Earth", which is nearly full and complete. So here are "My Guy" and "Beautiful", destined to be our 2004 and 2005 family albums.

I love the colours. And the stripes. The stripes make me happy.

So all the dust was forgotten. These, in addition to the stamps I got delivered to me yesterday by Amanda, I promised Jason would be my last scrapbooking purchases for the summer. So I have to hang onto this joy, and hope it sustains me until September. Actually, I'm kind of excited--I have a bunch of new stuff I haven't had much chance to play with, since I've been trying to focus on getting my kitchen done. Hopefully, as of sometime this weekend, that goal will finally be accomplished. (The completed kitchen, I mean.) And then Yay! Scrapbooking!

I am hosting a scrapbooking day here on the 22nd, so I have to be done by then--only a week and a half away! Yay! Scrapbooking all day!

I can hardly wait!