Show us your life link ups

Today I am linking up with Kelly for show us your life. This week's topic is link ups other bloggers can join.

I co host a photography link up on Thursdays. It is called click chicks.


We pick themes monthly and every Thursday post pictures that go along with the themes. You don't have to have a fancy camera or have any clue what you are doing. We like to challenge ourselves and be inspired by each other. We hope you join us!

Here are some of my favorite pictures from this challenge.

This is from close up week.

This was black and white week.

This was happiness week.

Just looking back through the pictures from this challenge I can tell my photography has improved. I hope you join us!

The themes for July are:
4th- red, white, and blue
11th- fireworks
18th- food
25th- sports

click chicks upside down

Click chicks upside down!

I turned my camera upside down to take this picture.

We have to talk about what the themes for July will be. We will let you know!

improvement

When I upload pictures to my 2013 album I always see pictures I took at the beginning of the year when I first got my camera.

It just amazes me how much better the pictures are now that I am taking them in manual.

Click chicks Dad

This week's click chicks theme is Dad. I just thought to myself today that I need to clear my memory card. I'm glad I didn't because I thought the pictures I got the other day of Chase and his dad would be perfect for today. We were out front watering like we often do and Chase very slyly grabbed the hose from Dada. I love Hubby's expression. He is such an awesome Dad and Chase just cracks us up and is the light of our world.  

Mom week in May was one of my favorites. Can't wait to see all the pictures of Dads! link up!

eyes

It is no secret that my little man has stunning blue eyes. I always tell people that he gets them from his daddy. What do you think? I think Chase and Hubby just have the most beautiful clear blue eyes. I think mine are more teal/green blue.

Who loves this little selfie too?

co sleeping

Have you seen this baby sleep positions chart from howtobeadad.com? I think it is so funny! Especially since we occasionally let the monkey sleep with us and we totally end up in some of these positions.

I always try to take pictures and I think they are hilarious but I don't get much reaction from my facebook and ig friends.

This one cracks me up because Chase usually hogs my pillow so I'm left to sleep on the edge of the bed pillowless. This time I decided to try and get some pillow between my pillow and Hubby's pillow. Then who should come along but Chase. I adore this kid and love when he wants to wrap his arm around me but come on! We have a California king bed and we are all on top of each other!

This one is a combination roundhouse kick, h is for hell, neck scarf. There's Chase in his Santa (aka ho ho) jammies in June taking up my pillow on the left with his leg across Hubby.

Remember a year ago when I wrote that the three of us fit pretty nicely in our bed? Yeah, not so much any more!

Show and Tell Monday: Who I am

I'm linking up with Becky from mrs. to mama today for Show and Tell Monday. The topic today is Who I am.

The subtitle of my blog header kind of says it all. I am a Christian wife and mama that loves photography, party planning, and tries to look put together. Oh, and I love blogging!

I'm reading What's it like to be married to be with some other Christian mom friends and I'm working on my priorities. I can tell you I have spent this nap time editing pictures and blogging instead of cleaning.

I'm obsessed with my 2 year old son. I'll quote my favorite shows here, "I'm going to love you so much that no woman will ever be good enough!" -Monica, Friends

My hubby works his butt of to provide and save for us. He's the saver and I am a reformed spender. Seriously people my Nordstrom card is dusty! Seeing him become a father over the last 2 years has been amazing. Our son is so precious to him and oh they love each other and make each other laugh like no one else.

I'm an only child to two wonderful parents who have been married 33 years. They celebrated their 20th wedding anniversary a few months before we got married. We live 20 minutes away from them and my dad is retired so we get to spend lots of time with both of them.

During the school year Chase gets extra Papa time when I substitute teach 2 days a week to keep that saver Hubby happy. Mostly it is to contribute to my dream car payment.

I have an obsession with Pinterest which has led to over the top parties and a 30x30 fashion challenge.

Oh, I almost forgot! I co host a photography link up Thursdays. This week the theme is Dad. If you took pictures of any dads this weekend you should link up Thursday!

Can't wait to read more about you all!

Summer Fun

Even though we haven't done anything on our summer bucket list yet, I think it is safe to say we have had a fun summer so far.

We might go to the zoo on Father's Day. Do you think it will be crowded? Have a great weekend! Happy Father's Day! Don't forget to take pictures of Dads and link up on click chicks Thursday! Do a summer fun activity this weekend too!

Click chicks: close up

I once again surprised myself by having fun with the challenge this week. We were hanging out in our backyard this weekend and I noticed a huge spider web. The spider must have been busy and fast. We are always in our backyard so I don't know how the web got so big. Before I cleaned it up I had to try and get a picture of it.

Getting a picture of a spider web is tough! I didn't think I got any shots of the web but was pleasantly surprised by this shot.

I also got my 58mm lens out to play around with for this challenge. I love these shots I got of my handsome boys. How lucky am I?

Next week's challenge is Dad!

Looking forward to seeing your pictures! Link up!

allergy update

I was going to do a post with funny pictures today but for some reason emailing the pictures to myself is taking awhile. So I thought I would update you on Chase's allergies.

Monday we took Chase in to the allergist. I have a friend that has a child with allergies and sees the same allergist so I asked her what to expect at the appointment. From the paperwork and instructions they made it sound like he would be getting a skin test. I had heard from someone else and my friend confirmed my thought that they don't do the skin test until they are older.

Well, they did the skin test. I expected complete torture. He had several pricks on his back and then we had to distract him from itching for 15 minutes. Once again my little man blew my expectations out of the water. He was amazing.

The peanut allergy had been confirmed with a blood test right after his first encounter and reaction. He has no other food allergies. The skin test let us know he is pretty allergic to cats. He had a reaction to dogs and dust as well but I think we will be able to treat that with allergy meds.

Before the peanut encounter we thought Chase had seasonal allergies. Pretty much every time he went outside he would sneeze once or twice and then he was fine. Now that we know what he is allergic to there was probably dust, cat hair, and dog hair in the air. He usually had worse allergies when we went to visit my in laws but I always assumed it was just the pollen or weeds in that area. Nope, it was their dog and cats!

We take Chase back in September to discuss his tight airway. We are praying and don't think he has asthma but he does tend to get coughs and is taking a medication to help with his indoor allergies and cough.

In a year we will take him back to have his blood tested again to see what his peanut butter number is. It was 22 this time. We are praying it stays the same or goes down which might indicate he is growing out of it.

I think I'm doing better not blaming myself for his allergies. I've kind of accepted that there isn't anything I can do to change my son. Yes, life would probably be simpler if he didn't have allergies but things could be a lot worse. I will continue to count my blessings and thank God he gave me such a wonderful child.

Blogger facebook group

One of my favorite bloggers, Mandy at House of Rose, was interviewed by another blogger today about how she makes money blogging. I found it to be a very inspiring interview. Who wouldn't want to make $40,000 to $100,000 doing this?!

My favorite thing Mandy mentioned was that she has a facebook group with about 10 bloggers in it and they support and promote each other. I thought that was genius! So I am turning to my readers and fellow bloggers to see who wants to join me in a group.

click chicks: rule of thirds

I have never taken a photography class. My fellow co host Jessica recently had one of her photos critiqued on a photography blog. People mentioned "the rule of thirds" and I had to google it. My goal with this link up is for all participants to learn as much about photography and practice with their camera as much as possible.

I definitely wanted to have "the rule of thirds" as a theme for the link up since I thought there might be others that didn't know the rule. This is what I found about the rule, "The basic principle behind the rule of thirds is to imagine breaking an image down into thirds (both horizontally and vertically) so that you have 9 parts. With this grid in mind the ‘rule of thirds’ now identifies four important parts of the image that you should consider placing points of interest in as you frame your image. The theory is that if you place points of interest in the intersections or along the lines that your photo becomes more balanced and will enable a viewer of the image to interact with it more naturally. Studies have shown that when viewing images that people’s eyes usually go to one of the intersection points most naturally rather than the center of the shot – using the rule of thirds works with this natural way of viewing an image rather than working against it. Read more: http://digital-photography-school.com/rule-of-thirds#ixzz2VRnbw6Nm"

I am obsessed with the day lilies in our garden. I keep telling people we are going to be on the mother's day garden tour soon. I love being able to just step outside and get great pictures.

I think I cropped this picture 20 times and I'm still not sure if I got it right!

Next week is close up. Link up!