Hi Kate here with our Sunday spotlight.  This week the spotlight is one of ours site members alyalyaly!

What is your real name?

My real name is Alyson, but everyone calls me Aly. “alyalyaly” is an inside joke.

What is your main job/career?

Well, I’m CEO of Morrison Enterprises – actually, I’m a full-time Mom, so I do a bit of everything… educator, chef, chauffer, interior designer, arbitrator, referee, travel agent, accountant. )

Are you married/kids/pets?

In October I’ll be celebrating my 10th wedding anniversary. I was born in the States, but my husband is Canadian, so I always kid that I married an alien. We have 2 sons – Joshua, 8 1/2 and Dylan, 3. My dear cat, Katie, passed away early June after more than 19 years together, but we still have 2 dogs – Nikki, a 12 year old pure-bred Siberian Husky, and Rufus, a 5(?) year old shelter-rescue that is a bassett hound mix.

Where do you call home?

We currently live in a town about 30 miles NE of Atlanta, GA. Of course, if I had my way, we’d be living in Australia or New Zealand (my dream destinations!)

Note from Kate – New Zealand is a FABULOUS place to live!! Hehe.

What are your three favorite foods?

Mexican food, California roll sushi, cucumber slices with a bit of salt.

What is your favorite flavor of ice cream?

If you’d asked me this last month, I would have said, Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey. But that was before my evil sister-in-law introduced me to Breyers Fried Ice Cream. Now I can’t even go down the ice cream isle in the grocery store!

Do you prefer salty or sweet snacks?

salty – Tostitos Lime Tortilla Chips!

What is your favorite beverage?

water – honest!

What is your least favorite food?

brussel sprouts or canned asparagus …. *shudder*

PC or Mac?

PC, but I first learned computing on a Mac in 1986

How long have you been digi-scrapping/How did you get into it?

I’ve been digiscrapping since May 2006. The story of how I got into it is a bit involved. I was introduced to digital scrapbooking in January 2006 by my best friend, Lynn (peepsmama), although I didn’t start scrapping for several more months. I never have been, and never will be, a paper scrapper. February 5, 2006 I celebrated my 40th birthday. Eleven days later, my mother – who had flown in for my surprise party from Las Cruces, NM, where she lived and worked as a certified nurse midwife – died of complications from CML (chronic meyeloid leukemia.)

Digiscrapping saved my life.

A couple of months after my mom died, I was in a deep depression. As the oldest of 3 kids, and the only girl, my Mom and I were VERY close. Kindred souls. She even delivered her first grandson – my oldest, Joshua. I missed her terribly and felt like I was drowning in my grief. I asked Lynn to tell me, again, about digiscrapping and help me find some freebies to download. The rest, as they say, is history. In the first 60 days I scrapped 50 layouts and haven’t stopped.

What are your hobbies besides digi-scrapping?

reading and digital photography

What is the most challenging part of scrapbooking for you?

The toughest part, or me, is using just one kit! Like my musical and literary tastes, I like to mix-it up.

What would you like to learn to do (or do better) not related to scrapbooking ?

I’d like to learn to let go of my anger, be less controlling, have more spontaneous fun, and knit.

What are your favorite movies/TV shows?

How much space do I have?? Top 5 TV: Lost, Heros, Doctor Who, CSI, The Closer … Top 5 Movies: Bull Durham, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Contact, Chronicles of Narnia: TLTW&TW, The Good-bye Girl

Describe your “scrapping” environment. Music? TV in the background? Drinks? Snacks? Back room, in the middle of your house?

My laptop is in the family room, so I can keep an eye on the kids, so usually PBS or Nick Jr. is on in the background. At night, when they’re all asleep, I often scrap in the dark, in complete silence, since I never get any quiet in the daytime.

How would you describe your scrap style?

Ever-evolving. I don’t think I really have a “style”, but I do enjoy trying new things.

Here are some of Aly’s favourite layouts:

And my two favourites from her gallery:

Credits - Love this one for the journaling!

I love this!! Credits

And here is her gallery at our brand new look site – come on over and leave her some love, she deserves it!

Thanks for letting us Spotlight you Aly!

Happy Saturday Everyone! Dacia here with your Saturday Special! Hopefully you’ve all been over to the NEW site looked around, re-registered yourself in the forum and gallery and are playing along with all the fun festitivities celebrating our re-opening! There is so much going on this next week (including a great sale), we hope you’ll all find some time to join in on the games, contests, challenges etc and win some great prizes. [Be sure not to miss the last blog entry- with the blog train- everyone has free brag book pages for you to collect.]  I know everyone has worked so hard to get the site up (Andrea- you are incredible!) and packed it with all sorts of awesome godies (and grab bags!!). So be sure to go over and leave Andrea some love in the forum and tell her how much you love the new look.

Anywho. Let’s get to this week’s challenge… I don’t know about you guys, but there have been times when I can get so down. Probably just cause I’m a girl and that happens. Those moods are rotten! I can’t stand being in a mood like that, but neither can anyone else around me. I must say the easiest way to get out of a mood like that is to think of all the great things in life- or to think of my blessings. Once you really sit down and “count” them, it really is near impossible to be sad seeing how much you have to be grateful for. From your friends and family to a roof over your head and your health- everything can be seen as a blessing- and something to be happy about.

This week I want you all to scrap a list your blessings- it can be one, or it can be many. I just want us all to dig in and find what we are grateful for and what blesses our lives. If you really think about- your list will be huge and you can hopefully create a page to look at the next time you are down that will brighten your day.

Here is mine:

And here are the LOs of our awesome CT. A BIG thank you to all of them for finding time to make a few pages for me with all the other crazy things going on- thank you guys SO much!

mikelinz:

shutch:

neeceebee:

jhopewell:

There will be two winners, each of which will get a $5 GC to the store! Happy Scrapping! Be sure to post your LO in the forum to be entered to win.