Making an Instagram Book

I'm just a little bit in love with Instagram.  I love the way it makes my phone pictures look.  And I love the every day moments I capture with my phone.  Of course, I prefer the quality of pictures I get with my real camera, but I don't always have my real camera with me when I'm at places like Target.

And then I might forget how we looked as we made our way through the store.

Or this sunny day sitting outside with my littlest eating PB crackers.

Or how quickly his moods change.

Or how silly his outfit choices look sometimes.

Or playing rock paper scissors during school.

Or getting a breathing treatment :(

Or hanging out in a tunnel at the park.

Or at the Ranger game with this cute guy.

I want to remember these every day moments and Instagram is helping me do that.  Shutterfly sent me a coupon for a free 8x8 photo book.  So I made this little book all in one night (the night before the coupon expired).  I didn't put a whole lot of time into it.  I don't seem to have lots of time for projects these days.  It took a couple hours after I got all my pics loaded onto their website.  You can do this on the Shutterfly app to save a step... I found this out later.

Here are some pics of the finished product.

The only thing I wasn't happy with is that the borders that I had put around my Instagrams didn't always fit perfectly into the pages that Shutterfly offered.  So as you can see, that makes the pages look not quite perfect.  I chose not to let that bother me (because it really does bother me).  This 2011 book was more of an experiment.  I'll do my 2012 book next, and by the end of 2013, I should have a good system down.  I decided to not use the borders from now on.  I like the borders they offer, but I'd rather have the photos look uniform in a book.

What are some things that you do with your Instagrams?  I'd love to know :)

By the way, if you want to follow me on Instagram, I'm packofwolfes.

Flourish Retreat Recap

I snuck away a couple weekends ago to Flourish.  When Chris announced that he wanted to go to a baseball coach's clinic in January, we both decided I needed a getaway too :)  I wanted to go to the first Flourish, but the dates didn't work out.  I'm so happy that I got to go on this weekend.  After a difficult fall, the timing was perfect.  I was craving a quiet weekend with lots of time spent with the Lord.  And it's just what I got, with the added bonus of making 10 new friends :)

We're all different ages and in different places in our lives.  But we serve the same God.  We had a wonderful weekend of encouraging and praying for one another.  

Let me start from the beginning...

I hopped in the car and headed east.  Got me a Sonic drink.  It took me about an hour of driving to decide if I wanted something carbonated or if I wanted an iced coffee.  Do you ever have issues like that?

I chose the carbonation.

And drove east on I-30 for quite awhile.  I got to sing at the top of my lungs to whatever music I wanted to.  I have always loved my alone time.  Road trips are my favorite.

Emily and KK had the lake house prepared for us when we arrived.  All of the details were lovely.

It was a rainy, dreary kind of a weekend.  There's just something peaceful about being on the water.

The lake house was perfect.  The schedule was perfect.  It was a perfect combination of quiet time alone, time in the Word, teaching time, time to sit and talk with the other women there, and time to worship.

A definite highlight was meeting Emily.  I've followed her blog for years.  She's every bit as great as she seems.  Genuine, funny, loves her husband and family, exudes the reality of her relationship with the Lord.  I could say similar things about each of the women I met.  I guess it's kind of strange to go to a weekend where you don't know anyone.  But it didn't feel strange.

Another highlight was hearing from KK.  She reminded us of truths in Scripture and encouraged us to make our relationships with our children and husbands more intentional.  It was all good stuff.

I'm bummed I don't have a picture with her... besides the group photo :(

When the weekend ended, I had the glorious car ride home (I chose iced coffee on the way home, in case you were wondering).  I came home feeling rested and ready to face my reality... a wonderful reality it is.  I am blessed.

I missed my Superhero.

Five on the 5th (February)

And it's actually on the 5th!!

All dressed up in their plaid for church.

I've always had a thing for plaid.  This pictures makes me very happy :)

Five on the 5th {January}

Our friend (thanks, Josh) works at a car dealership and surprised the boys with a BIG bunch of balloons.  Our entire house smelled like latex.  Good thing we're not allergic ;)

Anyway, I had to snap a picture.  We took this picture right when we got home from church.  I didn't plan the color coordination, but we do have a green, red, and blue theme going on here.  Fun how that just worked out that way.

Hope everyone has a good Monday.  Mondays are big school days for us.  We work hard all day.  After a long weekend (we don't do school Fridays), it's always a bit of a shock to wake up and get going.  But after a cup of coffee, it feels a lot better.

What are your Mondays like?

Five on the 5th {2012}

Here you have it... all five of them in a photo every month of this year.

Any ideas on what to do with this collage?  I'm lacking inspiration these days.

I'm so very happy to have these pictures.  I wish I would have started it sooner.  Whenever I look back at my photo albums, I wish I had more pictures of them all together and more with me in them.  I'm going to try to get out from behind the camera a little more this year.  I'm a part of this family too, right? :)

Happy Friday!

Countertops

I'm going to finish these house posts.  Really.  I'm almost done.

Next up is counters.  If I remember correctly, counters were one of our easiest decisions.

We wanted to stay with historical materials.  And I wanted them to be timeless, because I didn't want to hate them in 5 years.  That narrowed down our choices considerably, making the decision-making easier.

So they came in the back of a pick-up truck.

Here they are:  Carrara, granite, and soapstone.

They cut them in our living room.

Measure twice, cut once :)

I wondered if they were nervous cutting such expensive stuff.  But they seemed just fine with it.

Soapstone in the kitchen.

Granite in the boy's bathroom, the color of toothpaste remnant.  How do they get so much toothpaste on the counter?  Seriously.

Carrara marble in the rest of the bathrooms.

Butcher block for the island.  Butcher block is one of the only materials that comes long enough to fit our island without having a seam.  So this choice was made for us.

Tile up next.

Five on the 5th {Wrapping Up the Year}

This was some time in October... it's the best one I have.

November, putting up the decorations.

December, Christmas morning.