halloween to the election & all the things in between

let's just look at pretty pictures & pretend everything is ok.  yeah?  are you ok?

i'm alright.  trying to just keep going through the motions & find the time to do it all.  work, kids, husband, dog, repeat.  somewhere in there i find time to shower & take creative photos.  i've been trying to post on instagram more & that brings a whole weird level of self-criticism with it, too.  it's hard not to get caught up in likes & followers & the feeds of everyone else who's doing it better than you.

what was the world even like before social media?  i mean, if you wore a cute outfit & had perfect beach waves did anyone even know about it?  it has at least inspired me to get out of my yoga pants & wash my hair at least twice this week.  so it's good for something!

the boys had a blast representing the dark side this halloween.  it was declared "best halloween ever in the galaxy" & i'd have to agree.  every year it gets more & more fun.  fall has been wet but we've found little pockets of sunshine & dry weather which allowed us to get out & hike a bit here & there.

brooks is almost a year & has settled into our house pretty well.  he's insane, don't get me wrong, but we're getting there.  he's chilling out.  and the boys constantly tell him they will love him forever & ever no matter what he'll always be our puppy so i guess he's staying.

work has been great.  so many amazing families this fall & brides booking for next year.  i love what i do & am totally feeling a surge of excitement for what next year will bring as i ramp it up a bit for 2017.  this year was a bit of a regrouping & rebuilding year after the move & a primary focus on portland clients.  next year?  bring it.  it's gonna be a good one.

here are a few pictures from the last couple weeks.  i'm gonna try to take my camera out more & more & work on shooting on these darker days even when it feels too dark & dreary out.  buck it up buttercup.

it's Halloween! let's iPhoto dump.

happy halloween friends!

and to all my east coast readers, i really hope you're somewhere safe & dry & you weathered the storm alright.  i am completely hooked on watching sandy coverage & cannot believe the devastation over there... thoughts & prayers your way!

so yeah, it's halloween & this will not be a halloween themed post.  that will come after i take hoards of pictures of my babies in their costumes, which i JUST finalized yesterday.  yeah, i'm that mom this year.  we didn't even carve pumpkins!  you guys, i'm doing good to fold the laundry & shower occasionally, carving pumpkins just wasn't on the agenda this year.  but next year?  for sure.

don't get me wrong, things are going great these days.  elliot is sleeping a 6-8 hour stretch each night, waking up once to eat & then back down til 7 or 8.  it's GLORIOUS!!!  yes, i think the heavens just opened up & sang hallelujahs.  i heard it, i swear.  and?  oh my gosh, i fall in love with him more & more every. day.  he is just so sweet & happy & he smiles & coos & has my heart wrapped around his little finger.  i just want to eat him up!  i love my little baby.

i've been keeping busy with the ol' photog business.  i kinda just sat on it for a bit the last year due to the pregnancy/baby, but now it's time to hit it hard.  so i've been busy rebuilding some of my branding & advertising & working on editing from my latest sessions.  so that's been fun.  seriously, i LOVE all things related to photography & my photography business & would be happy sitting in my office all day doing business things & editing & shooting sessions too, obviously.  so that's been keeping me happy busy in those times when kiddos are sleeping.

pictures of me working on photography stuff just really isn't that exciting though, so you'll find that 99% of my iPhoto pictures are of p-ray & elliot because they're basically the cutest.

happy halloween!!

wordless{ish} wednesday: hallow's eve.

i totally failed to get the perfect picture of parker's halloween costume.  but even with these super poorly lit in-the-dark snapshots, you probably get the idea.  parker loved his vintage baseball player costume.

and?  he carried that bat to every single house, up every single driveway & up every single street that we trick or treated.  all while refusing to be carried.  he had a blast.  he never caught on to the phrase "trick or treat" but he did manage to tell every single person "please?  thank you!  bu-bye."

and i'd forgotten how much fun trick or treating was, especially when going with a big group of friends with kids around the same age.  we're totally already counting down to next year.  so much fun!

{linking up with wordless wednesday at and then she {snapped},  baby baby lemon, the paper mama, & a little king & i}

votes rock my world.

pinteres-ting on hallow's eve!

i can't not post on halloween, right?  it's only one of the funnest holidays of the whole year.  i mean, seriously.  candy, pumpkin patches, pies, cookies, crisp fall air, spooky movies, kids in cute costumes & all kinds of fun decorating?  i'm in.  except for the part about the pumpkin patch... it wasn't until saturday night that i realized we never made it to one this year.  MOM FAIL.  oops.

anywho, i'm not failing at doing at least one halloween themed thing that i pinned on pinterest.  because if you're anything like me, you created a whole halloween board & had grand ideas of making decorative spiders & gorgeous pumpkin centerpieces for the table & all that stuff.  turns out, i didn't have a single pumpkin in my house until this morning... and even that one is still sitting in my car.

ok, enough about me.  on to the cute craft!

i saw this a while back & immediately liked the idea due to its simplicity.  three ingredients, no baking & it's chocolate.  win win win.

here are the steps... as if you need them.  the hardest part about making these is saving some of the fudge stripe cookies to make witch hats out of.  i like to eat them.

and that's it!  easy peasy.  and cute, right?

now go have a fun halloween & come back tomorrow for what will hopefully consist of cute parker costume pictures.  but ya never know... it's impossible to get a picture of anything but the back of that kid's head these days.

happy halloween!

halloween vote?

cider mills, skunks, & steppin' out.

i am loving this time of year.  so many fun & festive things to do & lugging p-ray around to do them all just makes it better.  he's such a cool kid & just goes with the flow.

on saturday we went with sam's family to the cedar creek grist mill in woodland, wa.  once a year they press eight-thousand pounds of apples into fresh apple cider with the help of volunteers & good ol' fashioned man-power.  we waited in line for over an hour & a half in freezing, wet weather to get our hands on some of this stuff.  check out that line {top left photo}.  that picture was taken from where we were standing in line, so you get an idea of how many people are into this stuff.

once we got our gallon of cider i had to chug it from the jug.  waiting in line for that long really made me start craving apple cider.  and yeah, it was pretty tasty.  it was like a bunch of apples melted & had a delicious explosive party in my mouth.

that night our church held its annual halloween party & p-ray made his skunk costume debut.  big hit.  i had a ton of people ask me if i made his costume which made me feel a bit lame to say no over & over.  i'm just not at that level of domestication yet.  maybe some day.  {probably not}

on sunday i got to wear some new {to me} threads i picked up while thrifting in portland on friday while sam fished.  we're gonna call this pic our weekly "steppin' out" shot, mmm k? 

parker

button up shirt - baby gap

long sleeved shirt - old navy

khakis - old navy

shoes - target

amy

skirt - thrifted

shirt - american eagle

sweater - thrifted

purse - kenneth cole - thrifted! holla! i {love} this purse.  it's in such good condition!

to see more mamas showing off their style, check out harper's happenings by hitting the badge above.  if you're feeling even more daring, go ahead & link up with your own steppin' out post.  it's fun. and everyone's doin it.

and then there was halloween day.  we didn't do too much on halloween besides nap, hand out candy, make cookies, & watch a couple spooky flicks.  i did however insist that parker wear his costume one more time to make the day legit.  i'm glad i did because it may be one of the cutest things i've ever seen & i can't get enough of him in that little skunk get-up.  can ya blame me?

to see what parker looked like as a result of this crazy weekend, go down one post or click here.  he finally couldn't keep his eyes open any longer & fell asleep on sam's lap without warning.  so if your kid passes out while sitting up & still wearing his costume, you can chalk it up to a successful halloween, right?  i would say so.

we are still in the top twenty-five baby blogs because of clickers like you.  so keep clicking!  please, & thank you.

happy halloween. good night.

it was a crazy weekend around here, & this pretty much sums up the vibe in our house tonight.  i was away from the computer all weekend & now have 431 new blog posts to catch up on in my google reader... but it's not happening tonight.  tonight i am gonna go snag a couple more chocolate chip pumpkin cookies & pour a glass of milk, go curl up next to sam on the couch, & watch something spooky {& i'm gonna try not to think about how much sugar i took in this weekend.  oops.}

happy halloween & good night!




being away all weekend caused us to slip a bit in the rankings. show some halloween love & give us a vote!

let's get seasonal

today we're hanging out with family down in portland, so i thought i'd just quickly post a recap of the one festive thing we've done so far this year.  you see, i haven't really shown off too many festive pictures yet because well, we haven't done much of anything festive.  p-ray hasn't even been to the pumpkin patch this year... yeah, mommy fail.  oops.

thank goodness for good friends who call you up & say "hey, come carve pumpkins with us!" and when i'm all like, "we don't have pumpkins yet..." they're all like "that's ok, we have some for you"  and then i'm all like, "ok... are you sure?" and then they're all like, "yeah & by the way, we have egg nog & pumpkin pie too."  and i'm all like, "sold.  we're on our way."  end scene.  that's pretty much how it went down. 

so thank you heather for not letting me completely fail as a mother this year, & taking the only picture of my kid thus far with a pumpkin.  you rock. {all pictures in this post were taken by heather.  except for the one with her in it.  that was courtesy of isaiah.  thanks guys.}

don't you worry though.  today is scheduled to be a fun filled day of festive festivities involving cider mills, petting zoos, costumes, candy handing-out-ing, candy eating, & more picture taking than you can shake a stick at.  and believe you me, i can shake a stick at a lot of picture... taking.

i will redeem myself as a mother today.  oh yes, i will.



care to spare a couple clicks?  pretty sure that'd make you the coolest person in my book.  ever.  evvveerrrr.

photo challenge & tonight's random laugh

in case you were all wondering, the crock pot chili turned out alright.  it was just "alright" because turns out today was sunny & not rainy at all.  who wants to eat chili on a day like that?  you win some you lose some.

so i'm entering a picture into this week's paper mama photo challenge.  sorry the clarity isn't up to par on this one, it was taken with photobooth on the imac so i had to enlarge it a bit.  this week's theme is "me & mama."

this is one of my favorite pics of me & my little man.  it was taken when he was only two months old, & already you can tell he's super embarrassed by mom smooches.  ya better get used to it kid!

to see more pictures of cute babies & their mamas, check out the paper mama's site here:



time for some randomness.

my sister brought this blog to my attention.  it narrates the lives of the people that are living in your catalogs, & it's aptly named "catalog living."  here's a taste:

it made me laugh anyway... but i'm into that sort of thing, ie: things that are random & funny.

and now for some bloggity related business

first off, i would like to direct your attention to my updated "blog love" page.  some of my links weren't working & the buttons were all unorganized & my ocd nature was not ok with that.  seriously, the hairs on the back of my neck would rise every time i went to that eyesore of a page.  well don't worry friends, it's fixed.

if i missed your blog, let me know! i'd love to put you up.  it's a work in progress, fo sho.

and lastly, i couldn't get enough of p-ray in his new skeleton pj's with his zebra friend so i made a seasonal halloween button out of it.  feel free to grab it in all its festive glory!

copy & paste me:

<a href="http://www.agoodlifeblog.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://i55.tinypic.com/2emlg1e.jpg" border="0" /></a>

he'd like that.  go on... do it for the baby.



know what i'd like?  a vote! two clicks & you're done.  click. click. wasn't that easy?