Just a little longer!

Well yesterday was pretty eventful considering I spent the whole day in the hospital. My poor brother who is an EMT had to rush me to the hospital yesterday for pre-term labor. I have to say with my other pregnancy that was the norm but this time it was so different and I was stupid to wait so long. The day started with very mild cramping which I thought I had no reason to be alarmed since it is fairly normal. Then all of a sudden horrible pain struck and kept getting worse. I waited an hour then decided since I could barely walk it was time to go. Good thing I did too because we did an ultrasound and found out that my cervix was very short and soft. The Dr. Said I will be having the baby early which we kinda already knew since my other two kids were very early only this time it!s way too early and he's afraid I'll deliver any day. So I have to take it easy and rush in at any sign of contractions so we can stop labor. No bed rest really just take it very easy. We're. Hoping I can keep the baby in for at least 4 more weeks, I'm hoping longer but if I can keep him in till 29 weeks he has a good chance of being born with minimal problems.
I've been through preterm labor several times with both my other pregnancies but we were able to stop labor before it affected my cervix this much so it's kinda alarming, not to mention the last time I was told this I delivered my son within the week six weeks early. He was as healthy as can be but there is a big difference between delivering at 26 weeks and 30 weeks. I have faith though that he will stay put, I won't lie and pretend that I'm not scared or worried because I am, but I'm confident that I can keep up with this and my OB will be checking me weekly maybe twice a week to insure I'm not progressing too fast.
You never know though, he could stay in much longer or he could be a Christmas baby just not a Halloween or Thanksgiving baby! So this means no traveling for me for the rest of this pregnancy, I'll be working from home and I'm working rescheduling some of my online classes until I'm in the clear so hopefully just by a couple of weeks. We'll be working on more digital hybrid kits I think a new one posts tonight. Other than I'm taking it easy. So there is my update to my eventful week. Suprisesingly enough I'm in good spirits since the baby is still doing exceptionally well even though he is a bit smaller than he should be he is very strong. Here's to having a uneventful next four weeks!

My Print and make journey book!

Hello my lovely friends!

I just wanted to share my latest digital design, it's a hybrid mini journey book kit. It's so easy and so much fun to put together, you can print it right now and make as many of these little books as you like! The best part is, there is so much ephemera that you can print again and again and use them on other projects! Also every week I will be coming out with new inserts for this book design such as pockets, journal cards, and new cover designs so you can keep adding and junking up your book! I hope you like and thank you for stopping by!











You can find the digital kit to make this book here!

And other extras here!

Fun print and make mini book!

You can print and make this right now!
http://www.marionsmithdesigns.com/journey-book-hybrid-mini-book-kit-digital-292.html

Prima and Tattered Angels Blog Hop

First up we have this sweet give-away:

Included are:

• Prima Innoscense alterable flowers-3 packs
• Prima Winter Roses
• Prima Royal Verbena Silver Flowers
• Prima Miss Sophie Lace Flowers
• Prima Sugar Plum Roses-Banana
• 3 styles of alterable Prima lace
• TA Glimmer Mist-Sunflower, Blackberry Cordial, Bronze and Timberline
• TA Glam-Nightfall & Dirty Martini
• TA Chalkboard-Cherry Cola & Monolith

For a chance to win the LOVELY prize above just visit some of the other blogs listed below and then go to the Prima blog and let us know your favorite altered Prima product spotted on one of the blogs!

(Comments will close September 14th at midnight PST. One lucky winner will be chosen on September 15th.)

Hello everyone!

Welcome to my blog I am Marion Smith and I'm a Prima product designer and educator. Below are some pictures of some of projects made using the latest and greatest Prima products as well as Tattered Angels Glimmer mist. Believe it or not, all the distressing was done using glimmer mist in different shades of tan and brown. I'll be teaching these claases at Custom Impressions in Bellflower, California on September 23-24th and we're going to have so much fun so maybe I'll see some of you there! I hope you enjoy them!












Prima Blog:

www.prima.typepad.com/prima

Prima Educator Links!

Janine Koczwara

Nathalie Kalbach

Cari Fennell

Birgit Koopsen

Jamie Dougherty

Marion Smith

Sharon Laakkonen

Design Team Links:

Ania Lexander

Trina McClune

Hege Lundquist

Anna-Maria Wolniak

Trudi Harrison

Maiko Kosugi

Stacey Young

Leslie Ashe

Karola Witczak

Steph Devlin

Emeline Seet

Marie-Nicolas Alliot

Finnibair (Anna Dabrowska)

And finally hop on over to the...

Tattered Angels DT Blog:

Tattered Angels Blog

What am I up to?

Hello my dear friends!

What a happy update this is as I am back in the swing of things and phew it took some work this week! Lots of new stuff going on this season, first new workshops at Custom Impressions can't wait for those as I have a fabulous gift for everyone that takes the whole weekend and I also like to give freebies away during the workshops so that is always fun!

Also we have lowered our shipping rates on the website, shipping to the U.S. now will never be over $5.99!!! I'm sure you'll all love that! Also we've doen away with most of our individual products and are putting our focus back on fabulous kits! Of course we will still carry specialty items and hard to find vintage goodies. Also, A Piece of Craft will be debuting it's own line of products designed by myself this winter. These product are not available for wholesale they are specialty items only our website will have available and possibly some other kit clubs etc. These will not be mass produced.

Lastly, my book if coming along nicely it's taken a lot of hard work to update everything and since I was sick all summer I got to give it a little love and care.

I want to thank all of you for being such wonderful support this summer, it means so much to me and I truly value your friendship.

Ok enough rambling, have an awesome day hope to see you all back here tmw as it is the Prima/Tattered Angels blog hop and I have a special post just for you and you could possible win prizes as well!

A very happy update!

I feel so relieved! I got my pathology report back and was happy to find out that the masses I brought in did not have any fetal tissue or placenta tissue which is very good news. So, we don't why I bled or passed the clots but lately I haven't had much bleeding just minimal spotting. This may be the norm for awhile.

Garett did get me a fetal Doppler so I could listen to the baby every day and he/she is still going strong! If you could see the smile on my face every time I hear it you would probably laugh at how love sick I look. I'm smiling as I write this right now lol!

I've been resting a lot, haven't left the house much but I think after this week I will be able to do more. Nausea at night has come back which is strange so I've been unable to sleep well, so I've been painting again.

Since I've been on bed rest I've also been working on my book and I'm so excited about that, my goal this year is to finally finish it. I'm actually working on a second book as well on mixed media painting, but that is only in the beginning stages. You guys know me, I always have to be doing something!

Anyway, I wanted to thank all of you for being there and for me and for all of the kind words. It's very comforting hearing your own experiences, it really makes me feel like I'm not alone in this. Thank you so much!

xoxoxo
Marion

Sometimes being strong is hard to do

Well I'm glad I have a handy iPad since I will be in bed for awhile. I thought I may as well blog about this crazy week and maybe in a few months when I'm holding this baby I can look back and be reminded how lucky I am. I hope that's how this turns out. I'm so scared it feels like I cant think about much else. I've searching the Internet all day looking for answers and all I could find was horror stories, well they are horrific to me.

I'm haunted by what a Doctor told me today, he said that this may mean that I may miscarry but we'll keep an eye on it and get lots of rest. Then I read stories about women who miscarried just after seeing and hearing their baby. Boy am I dumb for reading those because that just made more afraid. Not afraid of the pain etc. But afraid for my baby, and afraid that if that were to happen I could never come back from it. "You have to try and rest and not stress out." says the Dr. Easy for you to say, it's I impossible!

Thankfully I have Garett who keeps saying, "Everything is going to be fine, I just have a really good feeling." Did you know when I thought I miscarried the other day he went straight to the computer to look up how to console someone going through a miscarriage? He amazes me! The kids are good to have around too, you can't help but smile when Brooke is walking her baby around the house in her pink stroller singing. Blake, he keeps bringing me cookies and food he really knows the way to my heart! Even when he sneaks a bite!

Anyway to shed light on what happened this morning, I woke up with more blood and clotting. Not as much as last time but it was not pretty and so scary. Got to the OB and listened for a heart beat and baby was still going strong. I really want to buy one of those dopler radios now so I can listen every day. Okay maybe every ten minutes, I cant help it. So I will continue to post about this pregnancy and hopefully soon these posts will become more happy and uplifting. Till then I'm going to search online for one of those radios!

Thank you all so much for the kind words and prayers, it means so much to me I can't even express how amazed and thankful you are all in my life!


Xoxox
Mare