Remember to Back Up!

Not too long ago, I wrote about how my computer crashed and refused to be resuscitated back to life.  What I didn't write about was how I had forgotten to back up my hard drive.  For a very long time.

Did I mention that I have been writing two books?

As it appears, my hard drive was messed up with whatever happened with the computer and all my data is now inaccessible with almost no hope of recovery.  Fortunately, I had most of the kids' pictures backed up on (thanks, Shutterfly!) but my books are gone.  One of them, a book on theology, I have been working on for several years.  The other one, a fictional story, was newer but represented hours and hours of work nonetheless.

It is easy to say that the immediate lesson from this is to always back up your data.  I can guarantee that I will not be making this mistake again, but I think my pain in this episode of my stupidity has a deeper root. 

Pear Decorating Fail

My parents have been doing some really fun renovations to their home lately which has gotten me thinking about mine.  Maybe it is a combination of wanting to decorate for fall or feeling like I'm living in the Star Wars and Lego aisles at a toy store, but whatever the reason, I have felt inspired to see what I can do to freshen up the house and make it look like a girl actually lives here.  With our food budget skyrocketing as all three of my boys have decided to go on a growth spurt at the same time, I clearly needed to be cheap about it too.