Climbing the Mountains…

…everyday it seems I have all these mountains of housework that I need to climb through. 

Yesterday I climbed three.

I had a mountain of papers that I needed to sort through stacking up on my barstool, threatening to crash land all over the kitchen floor if I put even just one more piece of paper on the pile!

I was able to throw about 90% of the pile straight into the recycling bin, so WHY was it stacking up making my kitchen look cluttered??

Next I had a mountain of dishes to do—this picture is the SECOND round of dishes for the day.  I’d previously unloaded and loaded the dishwasher already and this was what didn’t fit in there.  Lots of baking dishes since I was making some healthy snacks (more on that tomorrow!)

And lastly, a mountain of laundry to fold!!

I vowed never to do ALL the laundry in one day after the baby was born, but rather a load or two every day which is much more manageable.  However, this is actually SEVERAL days of laundry that just never got folded!! GAH!!  I got behind and now it’s become a mountain.  This doesn’t even show the 2 loads that were still in the washer and dryer!! 

Try as I might, these three things never ever are completely gone and done…there’s ALWAYS papers to put away, dishes to do and laundry to fold!

At least I’m learning to give and take with my time these days.  These are things I can let slide every so often if I need some much needed ME time!  I just kind of miss how these simple things used to be so easy to plow through and now it takes me ALL day to do them…or worse, all week!  And then I have to start over again!  GAH, death by housework!

I think I’ll go watch TV now.

Photography

I have been doing a lot of this lately...
That is my Nikon D7000 camera manual. And it's getting a lot of use as I try and learn how to use this camera that I've had now for several months!

I read a post from a friend of a friend and her thoughts about her transition to a DSLR describes exactly how I feel about my new camera!! High expectations for perfect photos (esp. when shooting in auto) and being disappointed with this new toy that I paid tons of money for!! I realized after shooting pictures at my brother's wedding and my niece's baby blessing, that I was going to have to buckle down and really learn how to use this camera and really work for those awesome shots! I can edit pictures in photoshop to make them look better, but I could make them look perfect and professional if I really learn how to use this piece of equipment better!

Recent investments included a 50mm f/1.8D lens, a tripod, and a remote. I also got a lightscoop, too, for times when I must use my flash (like when I'm trying to capture something Luke is doing and don't have time to mess with settings!). I'm already loving my new lens and the tripod/remote made my self-portrait shots so much easier! I'll still use my 18-105mm kit lens too, but it's going to take some more work and practice to get the kind of images I want from it. The 50mm lens is a bit easier to use and the pictures are already coming out much sharper.

I've found many great tutorials and links for improving ones photography. Many of them are pinned on my Photography board on Pinterest. I don't know what I would do without the internet--it's an endless source of knowledge and information and it makes something like learning photography so much easier!

Wish me luck as I continue to learn how to bust out awesome pictures! And look forward to photos from my practice shoots in the coming weeks!

My New Toy

Scott and I have been saving up for a really nice camera for over a year and we finally did the required research and bought one at the end of July! 

We finally decided on the Nikon D7000 and went for it! 

I’ve had it for about a month and have learned a lot already, but there is SO much more to learn!!  I’m so grateful for awesome online tutorials and e-books too that help you to learn your camera better.  If you know of any good ones send them my way!

On the Table

If I can't have Spring outside...

...then I will have it on my table.

All lined Up

I love this stage of development.

Luke lines up all his toys and then often times he will start counting them.

He’ll count all the way up to 20...

skipping 16 of course.

Sometimes he leaves his toys in funny places as he finds new ones to play with.

One day I found this:

And it really made me giggle

Not because they were on the bathtub,but rather that a dinosaur and a sheep would definitely not play nice in real life.

Watching the Hailstorm

I love these daddy-son candid shots.
My other favorite can be found here (scroll to bottom).

Photo Club Pictures

I am part of a little Photo Club--Lehi Photography Guild--in our neighborhood. There's about 10 of us or so that come and we've had 2 meetings so far. The assignments for this past month were "Portrait" and "Landscape." These are the pictures I had for those assignments:

Portraits:




Landscapes:

[please do not take my pictures and post them elsewhere without my permission, thanks]

Magnet Love

Gotta love
a little magnet love .

3 Things I Love About Today

1. My bed is made

2. It's mostly cloudy outside

3. This face:


[this is the real deal--no photoshop here! He's just a goofy kid]

keepin' it real

I saw this on a couple blogs--Here, Here, and Here...and thought I would do it myself too just for fun and tag my own friends.

Although, I probably didn't pick the best day to do it...but I guess that's why they call it "keepin it real"

Here's how the tag works; take pictures of the following things without straightening them up or prepping them in order to capture real life around my household. Next I get to choose 3-5 people to do the same. The point is to see how these things/items/people exist in real life. Take your camera and just go for it.

i TAG Jen, Vanessa, & Stacie

So HeRe iT gOeS...

1. My Fridge

It still surprises me how empty looking it can be even right after we go grocery shopping. I guess it must be those 3 years I lived with 5 other girls got me used to seeing a cramped and stuffed fridge.

[I don't normally put my eggs in a bowl, but that is what one must do when one egg decides to get stuck in the carton and you end up putting your fingers crushingly into it trying to get it out and thereby making a huge mess.]

2. My Kitchen Sink
As you can see...you caught us on a bad day. Nearly every dish we own is in this dang sink today.

[Scott came home and did nearly all the dishes! I love him]3. A Closet
This is our bedroom closet. I may have more shoes, but Scott has just as many clothes as I do! On the far right you can see our little baby clothes! We have more that I haven't hung up but I have to go buy more little baby hangers
4. The toilet
Yes, my hair straightener is nearly always hanging out there. We don't have a bathroom counter around our sink. I also leave it plugged in...I guess I'm lucky it's never fallen into the toilet...
5. My Favorite shoes
I have to pick just one pair???
6. My Favorite room...
I don't really have a favorite room. Our apartment is so small...but I guess I have to say our bedroom even though it's pretty drab. I haven't put too much effort into decorating or putting things up on the walls because I knew we wouldn't be here very long. It's probably my favorite room only because it has my favorite piece of furniture--our bed. The most comfy thing we own! If I had a comfy couch I'd be tempted to say that that was my favorite room.
Here's our bed-room.
7. What my kids are doing right now
What is my kid doing right now? You tell me.

8. Laundry Pile
We just did our laundry on Monday

9. Self Portrait
hello.

10. Dream Vacation
Can I go everywhere on my vacation? No? Ok, I pick New Zealand then. Perhaps an Austrailian/New Zealand cruise? Yes that sounds lovely

SmugMug

After so many computer glitches around Christmas time, we decided we better start backing up important pictures via the Internet. Scott did some researching and found Smugmug...Which is pretty much awesome. He wrote a very detailed blog post about it HERE...so I will spare you the same details of why we chose it and why it's awesome. [his post says you need a password, but right now we've taken off the passwords, but feel free to let us know if you have troubles viewing it]

Anyway, we've put up pictures from our Wedding, our trips to Europe, Vegas, other events--graduation, baby shower, etc. And we will continue to put up pictures--from last year and new ones from this year.

Go ahead and check it out ... feel free to comment also!

Our Smugmug Galleries

In like a lamb, out like a lion

...it's supposed to be the other way around. I think my jaw pretty much dropped to the floor when I looked out the window this morning and saw this

but i took this tonight, there was snow on all the branches and continuously falling all day...

Snow = Yuck.

Look Mom, I made Banana Bread!!

...well banana muffins...

(From Scratch)

MoRe LoVe...

tHis moRning I took my LoVeLy stRawberries, some cooL whip and smothered waffles with them. I cAn't eVen desCriBe how WonDerfuL thAt waS.

MiNi ciTies

I spent a good hour just watching Scott put together our new computer...hooking up all sorts of wires and such, installing hard drives and various other things...I surprisingly didn't get bored.

Isn't technology amazing? Just staring at all the little details inside the computer...blows me away at how remarkable it is and how it can do so much!

i think tHis is gOiNg to tAste GoOd...

This little face showed up on the spoon all by itself! I had to take a picture!

KaTiE'S KlipBoaRd

I promised pictures of cool things I've done to pictures with photoshop. Here are some from a post back in May.

And these are some other ones I've done recently and in the past: