One of my favorite Instagram pics from the week.

I’ll admit that I haven’t been in the mood to take pictures lately. I get this way just about every year around this time… I feel like my life is  just one day after another of the same old same old and get in a serious rut. I think I’m out of it now as I’ve picked up my big girl camera again the last couple of days. If you follow me on Twitter or Instagram, you’ve probably seen many of this posts pictures already. I promise next week I’ll be back with fresh, DSLR pictures! Until then, here is my Project 365 / Project Life post for February 3rd – February 16th. (more…)

One of my favorite Instagram photos from the week.

January 27th: As I mentioned in this post, Kelly is taking a cake decorating class for 4-H. We’be been practicing, practicing, practicing! If you have any helpful tips, please pass them along. She has really taken to it and is having a lot of fun! (more…)

My favorite Instagram photo from the week.

January 20th: This past summer we had a rabbit that lived under our front sidewalk. About once every week, Leah goes and stuffs lettuce or carrots down the hole to “take care of her bunny”.

January 21st: Ella woke up at 6:30 this morning ready to celebrate Martin Luther King Day. She insisted we make decorations and cards and she wanted a cake, but settled for cookies instead. She asked me to make a construction paper Martin Luther King with a mustache, bow tie and red shoes. Have I mentioned before that I have the artistic talent of a toddler?

January 22nd: It was so bright and sunny outside today, which made me think it had to be warm. Leah and I decided to take Meg on an outing to the dog park. Once we got there, I realized that it was a lot colder than it looked… 13 degrees to be exact. Brrrr! (more…)

(My favorite Instagram photo from the week)

January 13th: Ella got a guitar for Christmas. Today, she broke it out in pure rock style fashion… complete with sunglasses and torn tights. I’ve committed to try and take all of my Project 365 pictures with my DSLR, but if I hadn’t, this Instagram picture would have been in this spot. (more…)

Project 365 2013 is a photo a day project and a glimpse into our everyday life. My Project 365 goal for the year is to take the majority of pictures with my Nikon DSLR instead of my iPhone. I am hoping to stretch and improve my skills as a photographer as part of the project. More importantly, I hope to capture the fleeting moments of our life so we can look back and remember things we might have forgotten otherwise.

In 2013 I am also participating in Becky Higgins Project Life, which is a print / album concept for my Project 365 photos. This is a first for me, as I am and have always been horrible about actually printing out my photos! It should be a fun challenge.

If you are participating in Project 365 and/or Project Life this year, let me know. I’d love to follow along on your journey!

For now, here is my first installment of Project 365 2013.

January 1st: We spent New Years Eve at a hotel in Dallas, TX with my parents celebrating my moms 80th birthday! Even Meg got in on the chance to ring in 2013.

January 2nd: Over the holiday break, we spent a lot of time playing board and card games. Phase 10 is one of my absolute favorite games to play!

January 3rd: Ugh… I hate cold weather and find myself being lazy and wearing yoga pants and my comfy slippers all day! It’s like my winter uniform. (more…)

When I hit publish on this post, I will have officially completed my Project 365 for 2012. That means I took and posted a photo from each day in 2012! It may not seem like much, but this is the first year out of the 3 attempted that I actually completed the challenge. My roadblock has always been getting the photos uploaded, but as of today, they are all done!

I love looking back on my year in pictures. I print a Keepsy book for all of my Instagram pictures, but I think for my Project 365 I’m going to do a Blurb book so that I can have the words along with the pictures in a format my whole family can enjoy.

I plan on doing Project 365 again in 2013, so stay tuned for more posts. Along with it, my friend Heather has talked me into participating in Project Life as well. It should be a fun, new way to document our life!

Thanks for joining me on the journey! With that, here is my last Project 365 post for 2012.

December 1: Confetti Cookies, made and enjoyed for the Food Bloggers Cookie Swap

December 2nd: Ella giving daddy a lecture about riding on her scooter.

December 3rd: Leah chatting with Santa at our neighborhood holiday hayride

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Taking a picture a day in 2012 hasn’t been hard for me. In fact, I take so many pictures each day sometimes the hardest part is choosing which picture gets to be the picture of the day. Getting them uploaded to my blog in a timely manner has also been difficult, but so worth it. In my 2012 Project 365 wrap up post next, I’ll reflect some on what finishing this Project 365 has meant to me. Until then, here is my second to last Project 365 2012 post.

November 1st: I find it interesting that one thing that hasn’t evolved much is the halloween candy bucket. This is the same type of cheap bucket I used to trick-or-treat with!

November 2nd: A baking day = a happy day!

November 3rd: Kelly’s last day of being 8!

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Can you tell I’m playing catch up? I had no idea that I hadn’t posted a Project 365 post since October! Yikes! So, in the next three blog posts, I am going to finish up the pictures I still haven’t shared… which means that yes! I finally completed a Project 365 and posted a picture from each day of the year! I plan on doing Project 365 again in 2013, so stay tuned for more frequent Project 365 posts! But for now, here the Project 365 completion post, part 1 of 3!

October 7th: The surprise birthday cake my kids made me!

October 8th: A pizza lunch date at my favorite pizza place with my favorite 3 year old!

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Here’s our Project 365 life in pictures from September 16th through October 6th. Enjoy!

September 16th: Jacob playing another tackle football game. I really love watching him play!

September 17th: Leah eating breakfast her own way.. on the floor with the only dog we have. (more…)

It’s time for another post of getting caught up on my Project 365 pictures! For some reason this is probably my least favorite group of photos from the year. Several of the pictures within this group are some of my very favorites, but as I was going through the pictures I realized I was getting lazy and just taking pictures to take pictures. (Notice all the flower shots, for example). I’m going to work extra hard in this next few weeks to purposefully take pictures… to get out, look around, seek out photos versus just taking whatever is around me. Either way, without further adieu, here’s our life currently in pictures!

(Above) August 26th:This is how we do serious lounging in our house. Princess dresses, totally messed up hair, food in our mouth, and glued to something either on TV or the phone. Leah does it quite well, as you see!

August 27th: I went shopping and came home with 2 soft, beautiful, lacy shirts. Can I tell you how happy I am that this kind of clothes is currently in fashion?

August 28th: Sunflowers

August 29th: This is called keeping it real… I had a huge deadline day, which means I cooked and photographed 9 recipes. This is what my kitchen looks like when I fail to clean up between recipes because I’m in such a big hurry to get things done while the light is still good. I looked back and couldn’t even believe what a huge disaster it was. Yikes!

August 30th: You know your kids love you when they’ll go out in a winter coat and gloves in 103 degree weather to help you with a shoot for a winter issue. Thank you, Kelly!

August 31st: Remember Shannon and the Summer House Concert? Kelly was quite smitten (with very good reason!)

September 1st: More flowers.

September 2nd: Yes, we are in the “love our princess dress and not brush our hair” stage of 3.

September 3rd: Yes, even more flowers!

September 4th: Leah had her very first day of preschool today. This is her dancing out in the yard celebrating after she was done. She informed me then that she was not going back and “one day of school was plenty”.

September 5th: This is what you might look like if you ran all the way home from school in the heat so you could hurry up and share with your parents that you were chosen as the “Student of the Day” at school! Way to go, Ella!

September 6th: Two of my favorite things… rain showers and coffee.

September 7th: My friend Jenny invited Leah and I to join her and her daughter on a trip to Pryde’s of Old Westport (an amazing kitchen store in KC with a homemade pie bakery inside). The girls were thrilled to get to eat pie and cookies for lunch!

September 8th:Probably one of my favorite pictures, ever… Kelly and I took some yellow balloons out and just had some fun at the park with them!

September 9th: It was the Red Faced Runners 5K Race weekend! Look at what Cassie and Alli surprised me with before my run. Such sweet friends!

September 10th: I fell in love with this clock at the Blog KC event at the beautiful store, Raised in Cotton. In fact, the more I look at this picture, the more this clock is calling out to me. I’m going to give Carol a call tomorrow to see if they still have it because I think I need it!

September 11th: She was napping and I couldn’t get over how big her not so baby feet are getting anymore.

September 12th: Watching the annual Mill Valley High School Homecoming Parade

September 13th: Have you seen the new Curiosity Shoppe at Target yet? They have the cutest things. I loved this cup for my morning #shotofcoffee. Just had to pick it up!

September 14th: This was a very difficult week. One of my longest and dearest friends from high school lost her husband to leukemia. He was diagnosed on Thursday and passed away after a reaction to a chemo treatment on Sunday… only a few days later. They have 5 young kids together. I stopped to take this picture on my way back from going home for the funeral. Lots and lots of tears were shed.

September 15th: I had the pleasure of taking pictures of some beautiful ladies and handsome guys for homecoming tonight. I loved these shoes… and longingly remembered when my svelte self could fit into shoes like that and not kill myself!

Well friends, that’s it for now! Remember you can follow along on Instagram for more pictures as well as Facebook and Twitter!

I hope you remember to stop and snap some pictures of your life. Have a great week!