Olympic Scrapbooking

A few weekends ago I went to a 10-hour crop at my sister's church in Plymouth. I got there 2 hours into the crop and stayed til they closed up shop... so, 8 hours of "work." Well, you'd think I could get a get alot done in 8 hours. And typically I'd be embarrassed to say I didn't get so much as a spread done, but that's exactly what happened. How can that be?

Let me start by saying that this crop was planned in wreckless disregard of the Olympics. And I was rather enjoying the games anytime I was at home and could turn on the TV. Some may say I was addicted. So, when I got to the church with Kristina, my sister's sister-in-law (who was also an avid Olympics watcher), we both ranted that we had to find a TV to move into the scrapboooking area. This was going to be a historical evening. We wanted to see Michael Phelps win his 8th gold. We searched for a TV that we could move, but the fellowship hall where we were working was in the basement and no TV was getting reception... regardless of the great lengths taken to hoist TVs from Sunday school classrooms from 2 floors above (without an elevator).

Eventually, Kristina (who simply wasn't going to miss Phelps) called her parents who brought a 4-inch portable black and white TV. It worked! We plugged it in on the floor and crowded around it as we ate dinner. We had our TV... albeit the smallest, saddest TV I'd ever seen. After dinner, we kept it on and listened for any sign from the announcers that swimming was about to start. Here was our plan: As soon as we hear the cue, we'll run upstairs to watch on the "good" color TV that's bolted to a rickety cart that we couldn't move. And that's what we did. For Phelps' historic 8th gold winning moment, I sat on the floor fixed to the TV with 4 women behind me, each sitting on a small Sunday school table.

As the winner was announced, we all whooped and cheered. THAT was a good swim! But, as I turned around to catch the other women's reactions, I realized something had happened. I couldn't even figure out what I was looking at. Kristina was frantic, with big eyes and flailing arms. No one knew what was going on. The legs of the table she was sitting on were breaking. She seemed to fall backwards in slow motion as we all watched. Kristina, who's usually very talkative, couldn't say a word. One scrapbooker put her arm behind Kristina. What a sight! Kristina's legs dangling over the front of a broken table as she got closer and closer to the floor. I jumped up and used both arms from the front to pull her off. Whew! Although quite shaken up, she escaped injury. The table hadn't, but Kristina had.

Needless to say, between all the events of the evening and my goal to get titles and embellishments on previously done pages, I didn't get a single spread done from start to finish that night. Of course I was embarrassed! 8 hours... and what did I have to show for my time?

Since then, I've been needing to finish a Christmas spread that I started of DT and his 2 Kansas cousins setting out cookies for Santa. It'll be cute when it's finished.

So that's my plan. This morning I'm going to a co-teacher's townhouse in Mishawaka to scrapbook. She's been planning it for quite a while. A full Labor Day weekend crop from Friday to Monday. I know I'm not ambitious enough to handle the whole weekend, but let's see how I do for the day.