Winter Photo Shoot? You can do it!

My next door neighbor has some nice pine trees that I thought would be a great backdrop for our Christmas photo shoot. The weather is in the upper 40s, so I decided to head outside and photograph the boys in their [completely thrifted] Christmas outfits.

I took some thrifted frames, spray painted them black, and added a big "H" to one and an "O" to the other. If you have three, four or five kids, you could spell the word "JOY," "NOEL" or "PEACE."

 My husband then helped me with Adobe Photoshop CS5, to make the collage come together so cute :) I love how it turned out! If I can do it, so can you!!

Linked up to Seven Thirty Three

My big belly (28 weeks) and some griping

I have a few things I've been meaning to craft, but I just haven't gotten around to it. I thrifted a white dress shirt for 50c, and I want to make another dress shirt onesie with it; maybe I'll get to that today. I've been very busy finishing up some scrapbooking (I thought I was all caught up, but I keep thinking of pages I want to make...), and making this giant beast of a swingset for my son.



We got a good deal on it, so I couldn't pass it up. I went to the store to buy tea and bread, and came home $670 poorer. My husband said he's going to stop sending me to the store. I ended up getting about a hundred dollars in groceries, diapers, etc., the swing set (which was on clearance for $479 and was originally 8 or 900 dollars), and a patio table with six chairs and a umbrella on clearance for $250. I already had a coupon for 5% off my entire purchase, and then I decided to go ahead and apply for their credit card (this is only my second credit card, so it's okay!) to get the additional 10% off.

Since the stuff was on clearance, if we didn't get it now, we would have to wait until next year! As we're getting a patio poured in a couple weeks, I didn't want to wait a whole other year to get a nice patio table set. I'd been looking on craigslist, but I wanted something more contemporary looking, and I just wasn't finding what I wanted. Sometimes you just have to buy things new!

Oh, I can't forget that our CENTRAL AIR WENT OUT. Grr. We had to spend two nights at the in-laws because it was about 90 degrees in the house. It was pretty miserable, especially since I'm pregnant. It cost us... brace yourselves... $1600 to get it fixed. Of course it had to be the compressor, the most expensive, important part, that went out. And of course this had to happen just a couple days after I spent almost $700 at Meijer... and just weeks before we're scheduled to spend $3100 getting our patio poured...

Anyway, enough griping out of me! Here's a cute pregnancy photography idea that I've seen all over pinterest. I loved it so much that I made my husband photograph my tummy. And when we were done, my two year old must have thought that it looked like we were having a blast, because then he exclaimed "Do me! Do me!" I love two year olds, don't you? :)

A cute little boy in a thrifted tie

Or as most people would call last Friday, my brother's wedding!


We had the wedding at my parents' house. My mom did most of the cooking (I helped make the Ambrosia salad!), and I was in charge of things like wrapping plastic silverware in napkins then tying them with pretty little bows, and putting the tablecloths on the rented tables. Very strenuous. I also had the very important job of photographer :)

I had some time to squeeze in a little thrifting because we arrived to my parents' house a day early, and so we hit up two thrift stores and a neighborhood garage sale. At the neighborhood garage sale, I scored this dresser for $10. The lady had $12 on it, but when I was pulling out the drawers, one of the knobs popped off. She said "I'll take $10 on it." Deal!


I thought my mom was going to kill me because I dragged another piece of furniture home to store in their basement, after she just spent the past several months cleaning out the basement, getting ready for the wedding. My dad thought it was hilarious... my mom, not so much. I'm sure some day she'll look back and realize that baby Jonas needs a dresser, and $10 was just too good a deal to pass up!

I found a few pieces of clothes at the thrift stores, including a still new-with-tags dress for one of the cousins at Christmas for $2.60 and a cute, like-new toddler camouflage raincoat for $2.11. (Goodwill was having a 35% off everything sale, hence the odd prices). At the second thrift store, I found two more kiddo ties and a pair of little Old Navy khakis for baby Jonas, all for a total of about $1.50. I don't know what it is with me and little boy ties, but every time I see one for about 50c, I feel compelled to buy it. Isn't he handsome in his new tie?!

Snow!

Wordless Wednesday Friday



Ok, so I just can't do a wordless post. This actually isn't our latest snowfall- this was back a few days after Christmas. We got several inches (6 maybe?), so we can't take the kid out in it. We'd lose him in all the snow.

In other news, I've been busy transforming my dad's old "barn" toybox. My grandpa built it for my dad about 50 years ago. My brother used it to store all his cars and trucks, and now Joel will be using it! (For the better part of the past decade, the toy box has been used for my Christmas storage. So now the question is where in the world am I going to put all my Christmas decorations and the tree?!).

The barn unfortunately suffered water damage when the basement was having water problems, and over the years half of the trim pieces were broken off. I figured nails sticking out and sharp shards of wood probably aren't the safest thing in the world, and so I ripped them off and replaced them. The wood cost less than $4.50. (On a side note, while I was at Lowes, they were having an awesome clearance sale. I picked up four cuphooks for 88c and.... drumroll please... one of those chain thingies to put on the front door for 19c! The cuphooks are to hang up sippy cups in the kitchen).

I also was able to cover up some of the water damage with wood from the garage. Cost: Free! The paint I'm using is also free as it's coming from my stash. I promise pictures will come in a few days. I'm away visiting family for the weekend, but when I get back, I'll post some.

Stay warm!

Recapping 2009 in Photos

January- when did I become old?!


February- what a great Valentine's Day gift!


March- Joel is a month old already!


April- His first Easter


May- Maid of Honor in T-2's wedding


June was a bad month for my son's scalp, but he eventually got better!


July- Joel's first trip to the beach. See his little t-shirt? That started out life as a long sleeve shirt but I made it short sleeved since it fit him in the middle of summer.


August- Joel's first vacation (Chattanooga & Lynchburg, TN)


September- Joel's getting to be a big boy!


October- Joel's first trip to the pumpkin patch.
He's wearing a completely thrifted outfit!


November- Hubby turned 30 this year too. I baked him a sweet cake! And I bought him a sweet thrifted birthday sign :)


December- Joel's first Christmas

Save Money on Photography

I cannot believe it has been a week since I last posted. Much of the past week has been spent (A) Figuring out my husband's Canon Rebel XT (B) Looking at professional photography portfolios to get ideas (C) Considering building one of these PVP pipe backdrop stands (D) Learning how to convert a photo to black-and-white except for one item which remains in color (E) All of the above.

Did you guess "E" ? Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner!

My mother-in-law really wants us to get "professional" photographs of Joel done. The problem is two-fold. One, I don't want to spend the money. Two, what she considers professional is not really professional. She wants me to take him to Sears, Target, etc. I consider someone who went to college to become a photographer a professional. Those people don't work at Sears. Those people also charge a lot of money (rightly so). So she's stuck with our home photography. People have commented on photographs we've taken and have said things about them being professionally done.... they're shocked when I tell them that we actually took them!
You can even add borders and/or text before printing them off at Walgreens, Meijer, etc. to make the photos look even cooler.

I'm still playing around with the Rebel XT. I'm experimenting with the AV setting. Smaller f numbers mean that the background gets blurred. It's a cool effect that I have not yet mastered. Hopefully I can get Joel out and get some good photos tomorrow using this new-fangled technique. Until then, here's a few photos that look (somewhat) professional.