lovely photo Wednesday + Frustration

Link up with the most amazing God loving young lady you will ever find. Hannah's blog aspire is great, check it out please!

The girl loves a twirly slide and her mama loves that smile! 

On to the frustration part, I cannot figure out how to get my new beautiful watermark on my pictures in photoshop CS5. Well actually all of CS5 is frustrating me, I have never had such a hard time getting anything accomplished in my life, I guess I should stick with picassa and picnik!

A little bit of life.

Two posts in two days, get out of town!

We all have those days where we feel sorry for ourselves and think about nothing but what we DO NOT have and whine over why life isn't fair.

Well, I know I do anyways!

I had one of those days last Friday, and Saturday if you want me to be honest. This happened and That and some more of That happened and I was just in a bad mood and feeling like life sucked quite frankly. But then when I got on the computer late Saturday and uploaded some pictures that I took recently of my little family I realized that these little moments that seemed so insignificant at the time, just like every other day doing what at times seems so mundane it really hit me and put it all in perspective.

 I really need to soak up the time I spend drawing  octopuses with sidewalk chalk with my healthy, smart, and sweet daughter and my beautiful twelve year old cat too. I need to take in take in those walks that we take every day around our apartments, and the little treasures Madi is sure to find and give me. I need to appreciate that my husband is a wonderful loving father and a supportive husband to me , because there are lots of fathers that are nothing like him, especially twenty one year old fathers.

Not that I have not appreciated these things, its just that sometimes life gets in the way of how truly blessed I am. No scratch that, I Let life get in the way of how truly blessed I am.

I use to hear this dreadful negative phrase all of the time growing up, "life sucks and then you die."  I think that is the crappiest saying, because you are doing nothing but setting yourself up for an unhappy and most likely unsuccessful life. I want to be on this earth for a long time and so I am going to do my very, very best to live life to the fullest each and every day. I am going to work hard to be a positive, appreciative, giving, helpful, loving woman, and daughter of our wonderful God.

So with all that said here are a whole bunch of pictures from the past week.

Ten on Tuesday

I cannot remember where I saw my first ten on Tuesday post, but I surely did not come up it. Since once again I forgot to link up to micellany monday yesterday I decided I'd do this today.

Here it goes...

1. I am soooo excited I have a new pair of running shoes, they are wonderful! I went running last night with them and I swear it felt like I was floating. I have super high arches and really needed shoes with more support. I got these shoes and these insoles.                                                                           Lets hope these babies keep me as motivated to run as I was last night.
2. I have been taking pictures of everything lately. I bring my camera with me EVERYWHERE now, I have captured so many special moments. I just need to take the time and go through and edit and delete and SHARE them. I think I am going to copy Meg from whatever and do some all picture posts, love those.
3. We were planning on having Madis 2nd birthday at the "party room" at our apartments. I was very excited because it is right off of the pool, has a nice kitchenette, is right at our apt. and where we live is in the "middle" of all of our family in the state. BUT, when I went to the office to reserve it she told me that the old policy of just giving them a $200 check and they give it back to you if nothing is damaged has now changed to a $200 deposit AND a $200 fee! What!?! I have been searching and searching for a place to have it that does not cost more to rent than what I wanted to spent on the entire party. I am so frustrated and now Eric and I are now leaning toward not having a party and just taking a little trip somewhere just us three for a weekend.
4. I got Madi an Ariel {The little Mermaid} nightgown on clearance last week and now she is in love with "aral". So yesterday at the mall her papa and nana got her a Ariel doll from the Disney store {aka the childhood paradise}.  She did not let go of her all night, she ate with her , told her a million times " I love you Aral"  and slept with her.  The only problem, Disney does not have the movie out right now and I cant find it anywhere. If anyone knows where you can buy a DVD please let me know.
5. Okay so I'm going to cheat a little and add some pictures from the past few weeks to finish off my 10 on Tuesday.

 One more picture.......... Our new car! Eric's 92' Mitsubishi mirage finally broke down for good this time, I like to call it "the cockroach" haha, it seriously looks like one. He is now driving my car so I get the new car with all of the fancy features like LATCH which I am very happy about, I feel so much safer with Madi in the car now. After many test drives and weighing pros and cons we went with a 2010 Toyota Rav-4, it is has a lot of room {to us anyways}, but I feel comfortable driving it, I did not want a really big car since I have only driven small cars. One more plus, it is actually pretty darn good on gas.

Happy Tuesday Everyone!

Miscellany Monday

Well it is Monday again folks! I hope you all had a fabulous weekend, ours was pretty darn good! Here goes my miscellany......

1. Carissa who hosts miscellany Monday just had the most beautiful baby girl and she still made time to post today AND right after her daughter was born all from the comfort from her hospital room........ummmm.....can you say SUPERWOMAN!!! (go visit her and take a look the photos of her and you will really be saying shes superwoman, she is beautiful! )
2. My little brother is graduating from High school! I am so proud of him ,he is such a great young man. Where has time gone it seems like just yesterday we were playing with my babydolls together (haha)

3. This morning Eric found Madison asleep on the couch! The past couple of weeks she has been sleeping on her floor, of half way off her toddler bed, or beside our bed on top of the million pillows that go on our bed when it is made up (which it rarely is), and now on the couch. I know it is nothing to "worry" about but Eric and I both agree it's pretty stange or shall we say unique. 

4. I went to a great FREE photography workshop on Satuday, I learned so many little tips and tricks. It was put together by the organizer from one of the local photography  groups that I am a member of.  It was great to be surrounded by so many people with the same passion for photography as me, and to be honest being able to have an adult conversation without Madison was a much needed break. I came home feeling refreshed and ready to play with my wild girl, who by the way did not miss mommy one bit! She always enjoys her alone time with daddy.

5. If you haven't checked out Kelle Hamptons blog you simply must, RIGHT NOW, and start with the birth story of her second daughter.

I'm off to fold some laundry and unload the dishwasher before the hubs gets home, Happy Monday!

Better Late than never- Miscellany Monday

So I meant to post yesterday (obviously) and link up to Carissa over at lowercase letters for miscellany Monday! If you have never visited her blog, please do me and you both a favor and click on over, she is fabulous, funny, and the cutest prego lady ever! I am very jealous!

So here goes my random babbling....

1. My daughter is growing up Waaay to fast, this past month she has learned so many new words and is putting them together and making some pretty incredible sentences. She is also counting to 13, why 13 you ask, I have no idea, it’s strange. My personal favorite thing she does is sing a few songs like Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Old Macdonald, and The Wheels on the Bus (she does the little hand movements too) I love her so much and I must a admit I have had a few good crying spells because these past 20 months with her have just flown by. I am excited she is growing up and I love all of the I love yous and hugs and kisses, they mean so much to me.

There are some downsides to this age, let’s just say the terrible twos have came a bit early, but we will get through the lovely throw yourself on the floor temper tantrums and screaming in Wal-Mart over wanting to eat a banana, sometime or another, hopefully sooner than later.

3. If you ever see me I will sunglasses on, either over my eyes, or pulled up like a hair band, they are permanently attached to my head.

4. I am working on my new photography website, hopefully everything will be up and running in the next month. It has been way more time consuming than I had originally thought, but I think it will be worth it in the end.

That all folks!

Have a great Tuesday!

Four Facts for Planting Chums

 I found out about Planting chums while I was reading  Carissas blog, check her out shes simply lovely. Hopefully I will win one of the fabulous giveways! I have my eye on the necklaces, I am in desperate need of some cute jewelry to liven up my wardrope of nothing but solid colored shirts.  

Alright so here are 4 random facts about me!

1. I got a cavity filled this week and didn't get numbed up! I bragged to everyone for the rest of the day like I had just accomplished some major thing, haha not really! The dentist said that it wasn't a bad one and so he thought I would probably be okay without  those stinkin' shots that numb half of my face for 3 or 4 hours. I am so glad I stuck it out, it never really "hurt" it was just a really cold sensation. Plus it saved us some money.

2. I have been running  5 days a week for a month and a half now, I can tell that I have lost weight by the way my clothes fit but I still have not bought a scale, haha!

3. I accidentally scratched Madison's face this morning, I reached over to grab a bottle of cleaner from her and she jerked away and my fingernail scratched  her little cheek. I cried with her I felt so bad!

4. I have been drinking a smoothie every morning for the past week that consists of, 2 handfuls of spinach, strawberries and/or blueberries, a few ice cubes and orange juice. It is suprisingly good and it keeps me filled until lunch.

Have a great weekend everyone!!

Springtime in my kitchen!

Here are a few things that I am loving right now, along with the beautiful weather that we have been having!

Simply Rasberry Lemonade- Madi loves this stuff and so do I! They make really good popsicles as well.

I got the Crate & Barrel catalog in the mail and on the cover was this adorable lemonade stand and glasses. But heres the thing, I am not paying $50 for the stand so I have been searching like crazy for a similar one for a better price.

Why, you may ask, for Madison's birthday, which is in September, hah!

Hey, there is nothing wrong with an early start! Right??

Alright, enough about lemons.....

I am also looking for a couple of cute cupcake stands for Madison's birthday. I think that I am going to buy 2 of these. I like the wymsical look of them.

Starbucks coffee- This is how Eric and I start off every morning, if we haven't watch out , because without our cup of morning joe, lets just say we are not the friendliest people.

right now we are drinking caffe verona, we like it strong!

I am so glad that I spotted these too cool snacks for Madison at Harris teeter. They are materna GoGo squeez applesauce, you don't have to worry about a bowl and spoon for these babies. They come in these little packets with a top so if she doesn't finish her yummy applesauce I can just stick it in the fridge for later. They come in different yummy flavors, right now we have applestrawberry.

 But wait here is the best part, the ingredients are apple and apple juice concentrate and thats all folks!

and my last love Trader Joes! Oh how I love going in there and discovering new and healthy goodies each time. I am loving the guilt-less tortilla chips and hot smoky chipotle salsa. Major yum for me and the hubby!

What are some things you are loving this spring?