Over at Altered Art Chicks, we're going to be celebrating our grand opening beginning on Halloween! Starting on Wednesday, October 31st through Sunday, November 4th, we'll be having a storewide sale -- five days only -- and everything is 31% off! Also, we're offering a very fun, altered-riffic FREEBIE (it's in the emporium). Oh, heck, we won't keep you waiting... you can see a sneak peak of the freebie now and make plans to stop by on Halloween to pick it up!

It includes some very fun goodies: some hand drawn pumpkins and Witchie Poo from Audrey, all in digi "sticker" form (and the pumpkins come in both uncolored and colored versions), as well as a Vintage Halloween collage paper, a Witchie Poo background paper, and a Witchie Poo card from Melissa G. Cuteness!

In preparation for our big sale, we've loaded the store chock full of stuff that is perfect for digi scrappers, hybrid scrappers, altered artists, and paper crafters. Here's a mere sampling of some of the cool products we're offering (and they'll all be 31% off!):

We hope you'll come by and check out all of our goodies!!!!

Mike and I were driving home on Saturday after both getting haircuts, and we passed an Ikea billboard that simply said: "Home is the most important thing in the world." And it smacked me upside the head, right then and there... an epiphany of sorts... but let me backtrack before I share what that is.

Since my Grandpa passed away earlier this month, I have had dreams almost every night of being at my grandparents' house (yeah, I guess you can tell I've been struggling with the loss of both of them since I keep talking about it here). Sometimes the dream is just that I'm there, another time the house was for sale and someone was buying it and I was trying to talk the buyer into letting me live upstairs in the house, and other times the dreams have included my grandparents there in the house. I can hardly call it a recurring dream, as the dreams are different every night, but it is definitely a recurring theme.

Seeing my grandparents while I'm asleep is always a very soothing and reassuring thing to me (it's like I get to have a nice visit with them), but the stuff about the house has left me... uneasy and upset. It's not like anything bad is happening in these dreams at all to cause the unease. When I was back for the funeral several weeks ago, I asked my Mom if they had decided what was being done with the house. She said they weren't sure yet. I also had a very touching conversation with my brother in which we admitted to each other that, because we lived in six different houses in four different cities while growing up, my grandparents house always seemed like home to both of us. It's the place we always went back to visit. To both of us, that house is home to us and always will be (even though we both have homes with our respective spouses and "home" where our parents are... if that makes sense).

I know it's just a house, really. Walls, a front door, windows, a roof... a separate garage... a semi-circular gravel driveway. But to me, it will always be home. It will always be the place I loved most, the place of my fondest childhood memories, the place I could always go back to. I realized when I passed that Ikea billboard that all of the dreams I've been having have been my way of mourning the loss of that home. I don't know why I didn't realize it sooner.

I'm having a hard time verbalizing the import of this realization and the accompanying feelings I've had about it. I suppose I have to allow myself to mourn that, in addition to mourning my grandparents. I hadn't let myself do that in my waking hours, so obviously my dreams were taking over in that regard. The truth of the matter is, I will miss the people the very most, not the place, and it's a whole lot of nostalgia and sentimentality fueling whatever I feel about that house... but I feel it nonetheless and mourn the loss of that home.

On a completely unrelated note, I was part of a collaborative kit for Scrapbookgraphics called Impressions of... Gratitude (it's the first in a series). I had great fun working with this palette... see if you can find my stuff among the preview:

It's a lovely array of goodies and it goes into the SBG store on Digital Scrapbooking Day (November 3rd). Here are some layouts my creative team has already made with it. Lilian has done two already:

(full credits here)

(full credits here)

And Robin had some fun with my Boo! Paper Pack:

(full credits here)

And Lilian made the gorgeously moody piece with the Boo! papers:

(full credits here)

I had the best blog post going in my head while I drove to and from the post office a short while ago. Of course now that I'm sitting here typing it, it won't be nearly as well-written, witty, or thought-provoking. Then again, I don't think either of the latter two descriptors would really apply to the topic at hand.

While driving, I kept smelling my old favorite fabric softener. It was really weird, because it's been discontinued and I haven't been able to use it for months now. How could I be smelling it? Was I imagining it? I was thoroughly perplexed until I got home, bent over to pick up something up that I'd dropped on the floor while sitting at my desk, and realized that the corduroys I'm wearing today, which have been folded up in my closet since winter time, still smelled strongly of the fabric softener. I'm not sure how they retained the scent so long, but the smell of it is making me supremely happy.

It was liquid fabric softener from Arm & Hammer, fresh scent. I just loved it. The scent is just beautiful, and people would smell it on my clothes and tell me I smelled good! Earlier this year, A&H discontinued all of their liquid fabric softeners (I was so sad and the $10 coupon they sent me for asking didn't make up for the loss in my mind), so I hadn't smelled this smell in months and months.

It made me think about things that make me really happy. Things that make me feel good... things like:

smells I like (my discontinued fabric softener, freshly-mown grass, autumn morning air, pine trees, the ocean, the smell of my grandparents' house, the way my nephews' heads smelled when they were babies, Mike, Savannah Garden scent from Crabtree & Evelyn [also, sadly, discontinued, I believe], cinnamon, baking cookies, etc.)

music I like (sometimes it's hearing an old favorite song, listening to a new favorite over and over, discovering a wonderful lyrical twist of phrase in a song I've heard a million times, or the live concert experience for bands I really love... you've heard me talk about them and this topic a lot, so I won't list them here)

books I like (sometimes the book is so good, you simply want to jump into it, a la Jasper Fforde, or you just want it to keep going and going and going... Pride & Prejudice, anything by Bill Bryson or David Sedaris or the aforementioned Jasper Fforde, the Tolkein books, Alice In Wonderland, and so many more than I could ever list)

TV shows I like (I get almost giddy when my favorite shows are going to be on and I love discussing them afterwards with other people who watch them... The Office, 30 Rock, Flight of the Conchords, and It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia all have made me giddy in recent months)

movies I like (there are some I have watched more times than I can count but I never, ever get tired of them... Bridget Jones' Diary, Clueless, When Harry Met Sally, Dirty Dancing, Spinal Tap, the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Pride & Prejudice, Singin' In The Rain, The Sound of Music, The Princess Bride, etc.)

people I like and love (friends, family... there is nothing better than spending time with people who are special to me)

places I like (my house; Scotland; Niagara Falls; my parents' and grandparents' houses; Athens, GA; Mount Rainier; Toronto)

things I like to do (reading, sleeping, designing, digi scrapping, photography, travel)

food I like (chocolate, roasted red peppers, pizza, a really good salad, etc.)

Think about the things you like... and this brings me to today's question for you: What is at the top of your list right now and why? And why not do or experience one today... to make yourself happy... like I am... smelling my fabric softener and wishing they still made it!

I was going to post this yesterday, but I got caught in the tour press vortex (for some reason when I work on tour press for my bands, I become insanely focused and single-minded and lose track of time), and before I knew it the day had turned to night and I needed to step away from the computer...

Before I talk about the subject above, I have to sidetrack for one moment. As I type this, I have my iTunes playing in the background and Liam Finn's new album is pouring out of my computer speakers. Yes, you may recognize the last name. Liam is Neil's son. So I suppose I was pre-destined to love this album. But to be honest, I think I judged it much more critically because of who his father is. The best part? The album stood up to every expectation I had and far surpassed them all. I've decided he plays something I like to call "noise pop." Brilliant stuff... quirky, yet still very accessible. And every once in a while, he'll sing a note and his voice sounds so eerily like his father's that it's startling, yet not. The album isn't available in the U.S. until January, but Mike bought me a copy from New Zealand online. "I'll Be Lightning" is the name of it. Here's a sample for ya:

So, back to my subject line... Mike and I went to see our old pals The Tragically Hip on Tuesday night. It had been six months since we'd seen them, although I did get happy birthday emails from both Gord Downie and Gord Sinclair.

It's times like Tuesday night that I'm glad to have passes which grant me access to the seated area in the balcony... I could be out of the fray, close to the stage, and I had a seat to use when I wanted to sit down. Usually I'll stand for an entire show, but on occasion my back will get funky (I herniated a disc years ago and sometimes it reminds me), and I need to sit for a few minutes before getting back up to dance again.

The show was great. The room was full. And the band played some super stuff: "Gus," "Nautical Disaster," perhaps one of the greatest live songs ever (and the song that boasts my favorite rock lyric: "We live to survive our paradoxes") "Springtime in Vienna." But the nicest surprise of the evening was "Fiddler's Green" (this clip from a show earlier this year):

Couldn't tell you the last time we heard that live and it was lovely. I was able to take some decent photos as well (I'll include some below). We'll get to see them again twice next week, so I'll have to email some song requests. Last time I did that, they played a song for me, which is always great fun. We hung around for a bit after the show and spent a short while chatting with Rob, Gord S., and Paul. And, as always, we found endless amusement in the folks who somehow ended up with passes but didn't really know how to comport themselves. I don't mean that in a snooty way at all. It's just that some people (often they are drunk) get too loud and obnoxious, and they'd be amusing in almost any setting, really.

Photo time!

Got a few things to talk about... and you know what that means! I'm gonna number my items!

1) Neil Finn: So it should probably come as no surprise that I have Google Alerts and Yahoo Alerts set for both Neil Finn and Crowded House... that way I can read everything being written about the man (OCD much?). So recently, I stumbled upon a blog post by a girl named Annie, who, apparently loves Neil as much as I do. I love finding these sorts of random blog posts that really seem to justify what I already know and hold dear: Neil is a songwriting god. Well, it turned out Annie was at the same NYC show I was, and one of her friends was sitting right next to the guy who was hollering at some of us to sit down. It's a small, small, small Neil Finn world, isn't it? So, Annie... hi, and nice to have "met" you! You have most excellent taste in music!

2) Creative Team: My creative team member, Lilian, posted this visual loveliness recently, using some of my designs:

(full credits here)

3) My designs: Holy Hiatus, Batman, could it be true? Why, yes, Robin, it is indeed correct. Krista has DESIGNED SOMETHING!!!!!! Ok, I'll stop talking about myself in the third person now. I have a new paper pack in the Altered Art Chicks and Scrapbookgraphics stores. It's call Boo! and it's my take on some basics for Halloween. In great Halloween-y colors so that the costumes in the photos on your layouts can really shine... And, frankly, any of these could be used for non-Halloween layouts too (so it's a very versatile pack). And it's on sale right now for $2! Here's a preview:

4) Altered Art Chicks: look for the official site launch at Halloween time complete with a freebie (preview coming soon). And Audrey is having a warehouse sale on November 10th. I'll post an ad for it later this week. If you are anywhere near Rahway, NJ, you'll want to come by... she's going to have all kinds of great stuff on the cheap... have to make room for new stuff we're doing at Altered Art Chicks!

5) Porcupine Tree: This past Saturday night, Mike and I roadtripped down to Atlantic City to see one of his favorite bands, Porcupine Tree, in concert. We'd just seen them the week prior for his birthday when they played in NYC, but we missed a big chunk of that show because we got caught in insane traffic due to road construction. So a trek down the shore was in order big time. I have to say PT is not a band I likely would have found on my own... although I do have an affinity for prog rock (I like me some funky time signatures sometimes!), I doubt they would have shown up on my radar if Mike hadn't introduced me to them. The more I listen, the more I like them. Some of the stuff is a bit hard rock, some of it dreamy and soundscape-y, all of it very compelling. I'll leave you today with a clip of a song of theirs that I love called "Lazarus"...

And if you wanna hear a heavier song of theirs, check out this from their latest album, a song called "Fear Of A Blank Planet"...

Seriously... I am one lucky chick. I have the best friends. Last night at our Altered Art Chicks meeting, Audrey brought me a belated birthday present (which was fine, because I gave her her birthday present a few weeks ago finally, and her birthday was in JUNE!). One of the things she gave me is a joke and wouldn't make sense to anyone outside of the three chicks, but she made me two utterly amazing gifts:

A bumpy gourd (he's made out of CLAY):

Audrey sells these and other clay creations on eBay and will be selling them soon on Etsy too. She has made witches, wacky pumpkins, a mad scientist, all kinds of gourds, a mummy... they are so quirky and amazingly detailed and SO VERY COOL!

Then, she also made me my very own art doll!!! Check this out:

I have to find a place of honor in which to display it proudly.

Audrey rocks!

... I think I might have a few more minutes before my Altered Art Chicks girls arrive here for a pow wow. We're planning and brainstorming, organizing and making sure we're all on track with the list of projects and opportunities we're working on. Love getting together with the Chicks! Of course, we end up laughing a lot and getting way off-topic sometimes. That's just the way it goes...

I got the most lovely compliment on my designs today. It's stuff like that that really keeps me eager to do what I do. Somebody, out of the blue, saying, "Hey, what you do is awesome!" I never expect it, mind you, I'm not THAT full of myself. But compliments are a good thing.

Besides that, I think I jinxed the weather by writing about how nice and cool it had gotten (I'm sure putting out my fall outdoor decor on Monday probably did it too)... today it's well into the 70's here, and tomorrow I believe we'll be flirting with the 80's. (insert large sigh here) My favorite season is fall. Why, oh why, can't we have fall weather in the fall? Is that too much to ask for? Is the person in charge of the weather toying with me? Sure, I hadn't put away my summer clothes yet, so it's not a big deal, really. But I operate at maximum capacity and feel happiest when it's in the 50's and 60's outside. When the weather requires a nice, lightweight jacket? LOVE IT! Cool enough to be a little chilly with the windows open? I'm in heaven. So, Mother Nature... c'mon already! Give me back my fall weather.

For those who are curious, my outdoor fall decor amounts to: my autumn Snoopy flag (Snoopy and Woodstock jumping into a pile of leaves) (and, by the way, can I just say I always vowed I'd never have decorative flags, until we bought a house with a flagpole already on the tree in the front yard and whaddaya know -- I have flags for every season and holiday now -- I got sucked in by suburban peer pressure or something), two faux pumpkins for the front steps (since the squirrels around here LOVE to eat my real pumpkins, I can't get those anymore), and Indian corn (wait, should that be Native American corn????) hanging on the front door. As you can tell, I really go all out with the decorations.

So, that brings me to another question for you guys... do you decorate your house (inside or outside) for fall and/or Halloween, and if you do, what decorations do you have?

Yeah, I'm here. I know, I know... It's been a while...

Last week was a bit nutty. We had to go out of town for my Grandpa's wake and funeral for several days, and since I got very little done in the way of work while I was away (understandably), Thursday and Friday were insane "must catch up" days here.

Thank you so much for the many kinds comments I got about my Grandpa. I have to say that my own comment in that blog post about being at peace was really spot-on and has continued to be so. When talking to my Mom while we were there, she said to me, "He was ready to go be with Grandma." And my Aunt mentioned that wanting to have him with us for more time was selfish, really, when he missed my Grandma so very much. So it was with many tears, sure, that I paid my last respects, but I haven't found myself breaking down into tears repeatedly every day since like I did when my Grandma passed away. This is not to say I miss him less... I surely miss him just as much, but it's been a wee bit easier in some ways. I know that the sadness will come in waves in the future, that the ache of missing him will never, ever go away. But I also hold close to my heart the fact that I was able to make a trip to visit him not long before he passed away. And that even though he is no longer with us, I still think about him every single day. And have so many wonderful memories of time spent with him.

Saturday was Mike's 40th... now the "you're so much older than me" jokes can stop for another year (until I turn 41 a month before he does). It was so nice to be able to spend the entire day together on such a big-deal birthday!

Yesterday and today, I was supposed to have jury duty. However, my group was excused BOTH DAYS! Thank goodness, because my day job has been insanely busy. I feel like a train that is close to running off the tracks... barely keeping it all under control. Just a lot of stuff on my plate at the moment. I'm trying to be mindful of this and not let everything overwhelm me.

I am loving the fall weather. It has finally gotten to the point where the air is really chilly in the mornings when I take Mike to the train station, and even though I'm shivering, I love it!!! And, boy, whoever said the sense most strongly tied to memory is smell was soooo right... the smell of the air in the mornings takes me right back to walking to the school bus when I was younger. I love that little rush of nostalgia and comfort that brings (yeah, I liked going to school).

That's all the news that's fit to print today. More to come, soonish.

I got the call early this morning from my Dad that my Grandpa, James Russell Johnstone (1918-2007), passed away in the wee hours of the morning... around 4 a.m. He came down with pneumonia about a week and a half ago, and his weakened body simply couldn't fight it any longer. My Mom and my Aunts were with him, but everyone had fallen asleep. My Mom woke up at 4 a.m. and noticed that the oxygen machine was still going, but she couldn't hear my Grandpa breathing anymore. I'm just glad that he had all three of his girls with him. And I'm glad that he can be with my Grandma again now, as they were virtually inseparable and I think the months since her passing were incredibly difficult for him.

So I'm at peace. I was able to have a fantastic visit with him over my birthday weekend several weeks ago, and I spoke to him almost every day on the phone while he was in the hospital, most recently on Tuesday evening when he had a room full of visitors. We were both joking on the phone: me - that I was upset that I hadn't been invited to the party in his room; he - that he was going to beat me at cards next time he saw me. At the end of the conversation, he told me to take good care of myself and that he loved me. I have to wonder, in retrospect, if he knew he was going to be too weak to talk on the phone again after that.

My Grandpa was a wickedly funny guy. You could always count on him to make you laugh. I'll miss the long-running contest he and I had going for years and years with the card game, Snap. We'd play whenever we saw each other, and between "championship games," we'd trash talk or call in our bragging rights, depending on who had won most recently. I even took playing cards with me to the hospital when I went to see him a few weeks ago, but he wasn't up to playing then. I held them up so he could see them and said, "Just in case you want to play a quick game..."

And I realized earlier today that if he saw me now, he'd say something like, "Ah, Kris, don't cry for me. It's ok. I'm fine and dandy now." So I'm trying not to. But that's easier said than done.

Still have all of the things that go along with it -- the wake and the funeral -- and even though it's under such circumstances, I'm still excited to be seeing my family.

So I'll close this post with a picture of my Grandpa, taken (I believe) in the Philippines when he was stationed there during World War II. In this photo, he could be the twin of my cousin, Mark. Good looking fellow, wasn't he?

I miss you already, Grandpa, and I love you. And you are the reigning Snap Champion of the Universe. You get to keep the title, since you won it fair and square back in June.

Ya know, I've been wanting to blog all week. Just pour myself out, so to speak, in a fingers-on-the-keyboard, cyber-rific sort of way. But I, every time I logged on here to start typing, clammed right up, deleted what I wrote, and went on to do other stuff (i.e. day job work). I said to a friend of mine that it's like I've really wanted to talk, but I've instead put myself into a self-imposed coccoon. Sometimes you just have to insulate. And grieve. And not tell everyone you know about how you are feeling.

My Grandpa's health has taken a serious decline in the past week. (And to the further-flung relatives who read my blog -- those cousins of mine several times removed -- he got your cards and letters and they meant the world to him.) He's in hospice care now, and I'll let that first part of the sentence say everything on its own.

So in the midst of my cocooning and crying and general moping this week, a friend of mine (who I used to work with at RCA Records), sent me flowers, out of the blue, to thank me for giving her some great press leads for one of her projects. She's a good friend and, like me, is an indie publicist, so we share info with each other.

And I have to say, those flowers really meant the world when they arrived. And they cheered me up at a time I needed cheering. Gave me comfort. Warmed my heart. I told her when I thanked her that she couldn't have picked a better time to send me flowers.

Thoroughly unexpected loveliness. Thanks, Jenn!

They say good things come to those who wait. So, finally the waiting is over. And I hope this paper was worth the wait. At the risk of sounding completely full of myself, I love this paper. It's got all sorts of color going on. Here's a preview:

If you want it, you can download it here. And if you do, tell me what you had for lunch today. (Ok, I stole that question from one of my fave blogs, Journal Revolution, who asked the same question recently.) For those of you with inquiring minds, I had a bowl of Oat Cluster Cheerios Crunch cereal. YUM!