New website - lenshero.com

So a friend I met in my photography classes at GRCC gave me a link to a new site called LensHero!  I went looking and found that it's a great way to see new lens' that would work for your particular camera in your price range!  That has to be my favorite feature.  First you select your camera model, next you select your price range, and finally you select what type of lens you are looking for.  I like that with this site you are able to pick a max price.  While I know there are MANY lenses out there that I can not afford at this time, it's nice to see things that will work for my needs AND my budget!  I have now bookmarked this site!

Here, check it out:
lenshero.com

30 Things Before I'm 30!

So, Michelle over at Scrapfreak posted a link to a blog today where Elise Blaha posted her mini album of 25 things to do before she turned 25.  This reminded me that I also wanted to do a list of 30 things to do before I turn 30.  And, well 30 isn't so far away anymore!  So here it goes, this is my list of 30 things to do by January 15, 2012:

1. Get married


2. Earn a college degree

3. Own a home

4. plant a vegetable garden

5. learn to use a sewing machine

6. make a quilt

7. lose 15 lbs. and maintain it

8. buy a camper

9. read 10 books that I WANT to read (not for school)

10. learn how to make 15 new meals

11. scrap my wedding pictures

12. get a dog

13. train the new dog!

14. take a family vacation

15. join a moms group or scrap group

16. Take Julia to meet Bree, Mara, and GA friends

17. Go to GA to meet Baby Bree

18. update to a new camera (once I learn current camera!)

19. learn Photoshop in more detail

20. buy new living room furniture

21. create my "scraproom"

22. find a job I enjoy

23. restart my Disney movie collection

24. visit NYC

25. create a family budget-AND STICK TO IT!

26. make a handmade decor element for each room of my home

27. host and cook a major family meal (i.e. Thanksgiving or Christmas)

28. start holiday traditions for my family

29. make a doll for Julia

30. BLOG THIS-and keep it up to date!
 
Thanks Michelle for the push I needed to get this written down and get started!

Friday Fill-ins...

1. When it's quiet I enjoy it!  Quiet times are few and far between these days!


2. Julia has grown so much in what seems like a month.

3. My heart is full of love.

4. I can't believe it's already July.

5. In the town where I was born is where I still live.  Boring, right?

6. Lou is a great Daddy.  That is something I really love about my significant other / friend.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to Julia taking a nap, tomorrow my plans include possibly going to the guys show and Sunday, I want to spend the day with my family celebrating the 4th of July!

IT'S A GIRL!!!!!

After nine long months, I am so happy to announce the arrival of my BABY GIRL, Julia Marie!  She was born April 28th at 4:54pm.

Julia Marie

April 28, 2010

4:54 pm

7 lbs. 14 oz.

20 in. long

So, here is how it went.  Tuesday night Lou and Matt went golfing and I was hanging out at home.  I decided I would take a nap while they were out and then I would make dinner.  Well, I layed down, but I wasn't able to nap because I had a lot of pressure in my back and started having contractions that were feeling different than the Braxton Hicks contractions that I had been getting used to.  So, I got up and started making tacos to try to ignore it.  I didn't want to get my hopes up!  When Lou got home, I told him I thought this was real this time, but I still wasn't too sure myself.  Well, the contractions kept going, but they weren't getting stronger or any closer together, so I figured it was just another false alarm.  I decided around midnight I would just go lay down and try to get some sleep.  I turned on the replay of the Tigers game and tried to go to bed.  By the time the game was done I knew it was real this time.  I was in labor!

We went to the hospital at about 4am.  I was thinking my contractions were about 10 minutes apart, but when I was hooked to the monitors I saw that they were in fact 5 minutes apart, I just didn't realize that I was having back labor too.  So, we were checked in and in a labor room by 6am.  My doctor broke my water around 8am and shortly after I decided to get my epidural.  After a couple hours my labor was not getting stonger, so they decided to give me Pitocin.  I was a bit worried since I know of a few people that had negative results with Pitocin, but it worked for me!  I was completely dialated and ready to push at about 3 pm, and our little girl made her way into the world at 4:54pm.  So, about 12 hours after arriving to the hospital!

We didn't know if we were having a boy or girl.  I thought through the whole pregnancy that I wanted a boy, but when I heard the doctor say "It's a Girl" I was so excited and couldn't imagine it any other way now!

Here are a few of the pictures my Mom took, I didn't really take any pictures in the hospital.  I have taken some since we got home yesterday, so I will upload and share some of those soon.

Julia and Daddy

Julia and Grandpa

Julia and Aunt Kacie

Julia and Aunt Andi

Julia and Aunt Stephanie

A Week in the Life-Day 5

No pictures for today!  I woke up with a stomach bug and spent 90% of my day in bed.  With the tv season ending, I didn't have much to watch from the Tivo, so I had to rely on Friday cable.  Let me just tell you, Friday tv SUCKS!  I did get out of bed for a bit to watch some basketball with Lou, but ended up getting blurry vision and a headache, so back to bed for me!  On a good note, 7 DAYS UNTIL I'M DUE!!!  While I am very excited to not be pregnant, I am also kind of nervous now that I am counting days rather than weeks!!!

A Week in the Life-Day 4

I spent the morning relaxing and doing some exam prep for my Psych class.  I also watched Zoe run around the house chasing every ball she could find.  And if you know how much Lou plays golf in the house, you know that she had plenty of balls laying around to chase!  She goes from one extreme to the other.  Either she's tearing through the house after something, or she's laying around and gets mad if you happen to disturb her while she is relaxing!

Today I did a lot of running around.  First I went through some of my clothes here, then I went to my parents house and went through some clothes.  I am trying to get rid of some of the clutter I have by getting rid of things I don't need.  I have a ton of clothes, but I really don't care for many of them and I know that I won't wear a lot of them after the baby, so it's time for them to go!

After that, Lou and I ran out to Babies R Us to exchange some things we got doubles of.  All I ended up buying instead was a cover for the changing table pad.  Nothing too exciting.

I then came home a scrapped some while Lou went golfing.  Then I tried making homemade sloppy joe sauce.  Matt Ford and Lou said it was good, so I guess it passed!

A Week in the Life-Day 3

Today I woke up WAYYY to early.  I was up and waiting for the 5am news to start.  Needless to say, I checked up on things online, grabbed a pop tart and milk for breakfast, and then went and layed back in bed trying to sleep.  Watched the news, then caught up on the rest of the shows on the Tivo.  Called good 'ol Marvin at 8, then went and took a little nap.

I woke back up around 11, and took care of bills and doing our budget for the week.  Got in the shower, got dressed and headed to my 38 week doctors appointment.  The worst part about going to the doctor every week now is that they just squeeze you in between appointments.  This usually means a lot of waiting.  Good thing I have Facebook and games on my phone!  Just a regular doctors visit.  Measuring right on schedule, heart rate is 134.  Dr. Edvenson did give me some scary news though, he said he guesses the baby is weighing in at the high end of 8 lbs. and if I go until my due date or over, the baby could reach 9 lbs!  Umm, lets hope he's over estimating!

After the doctors appointment, Lou and I came home and relaxed a bit until time for Burger Night at KofC.  We picked Annie up and went and grabbed burgers and fries.  Can't beat $3.50 burger baskets!  After that we went and hung out with Amy and the twins.  Grandma Terry got the girls a Cadillac Escalade Power Wheels and they have been wanting to show it to Lou-Lou.  The Power Wheels is so cool!  The baby will be getting one of these when it's old enough for sure! (Maybe not pink if it's a boy!)

Ashley drove first.  She was having a hard time keeping it on the sidewalk at first.  She was too busy watching what everyone else was doing instead of watching where she was going.  She got a little better on her second trip around the cul-de-sac.

Cassidy drove next.  She is a very confident driver, but got frustrated if she did go off road a bit!

We had a nice walk while the girls practiced driving.  Then we went back to play in the back yard and enjoy the nice weather.

We headed home around 8, I get tired so early these days!  It was time for me to just sit home and relax.  I am working on a mini album for the Scrapfreak May class.  The best thing about moving the guest bed into my scrap room is that I can sit on the bed with my feet up and scrap.  I think I could get used to this!  Although Lou informed me that the bed is supposed to be for him and Zoe to hang out on while they are in here with me, so I should keep it cleared off!

Headed to bed around midnight and watched tv for a bit.  I tried to read a book I have had laying around the house for a while, but I was too tired to concentrate, so I gave up and went to sleep!

A Week in The Life-Day 2

I know it's Wednesday already, but I am just getting around to blogging Tuesday!

The Winter 2010 semester in coming to an end this week, so I spent a lot of my day finishing up my online Psych class, and writing my final paper for my Social Work 103 class.  I have everything completed, now just need to take my exams on Monday, and I am done for the semester!

I also took a few breaks from school work to relax in bed and keep my feet up.  I had Braxton Hicks contractions all day, so just laying down and taking it easy was neccessary.  I have to say that I LOVE my Boppy pillow and Tivo more than a lot of things in life!  I caught up on First 48, Runaway Squad, and Intervention.  Not to mention the Season Finale and Reunion episode of 16 and Pregnant!  I know, I watch way too much reality TV.

Nothing really exciting to report for today. With all the excitement that is sure to come my way soon, I appreciate having the time to lay in bed and relax!

A Week In the Life (inspired by Ali Edwards)

The Daily Inspiration at Scrapfreak today is Ali Edwards "A Week in the Life" project.  (Read more about it here.)  I thought this would be something fun to do as a way to document the last few days until we have a baby in the house with us!  So, manybe mine is more of a "Countdown to Baby" rather than a week in the life.  If I have it my way, this won't last another week, but I think the baby has other plans and this could last longer than a week!  There are a few things I want to get done around the house to prepare, and I also want a way to see how much things change once I am responsible for more than just myself!  I want to scrap these days, but for now I am just going to post some unedited photos and my journaling here in case I don't get to it right away!

Day 1: Monday, April 19, 2010

Today I started the day by cleaning our bedroom so I could put the pack and play in ready for baby to come home.  While I am still standing strongly on trying to get the baby on a good sleeping/eating schedule as soon as possible and having the baby sleep in it's crib right away, I am also not an idiot!  I like my sleep and I know it will take me a little while to get used to getting up with the baby in the middle of the night, so I want to have the baby in our room for a little while.  I decided to put the Pack 'n Play together in the living room.  I wasn't thinking about having to fit it through the doorway into our room.  Needless to say, I had to take the things almost completely apart to fit it through the door to our room and put it back up in there.

After getting my room ready, I organized a few more things in the baby's room.  While I don't remember any more than just the stories, my mom said that I loved Beatrix Potter books when I was a toddler.  She has told me many times about our trips to the library so I could get my books.  This is something that I have always enjoyed hearing about, so with the baby's room, I have decided to do a Peter Rabbit/Beatrix Potter theme.  The bedding I picked out is mostly blue, tan, and white.  It is a bit boyish, but I decided that I can add flowers and other colors to the room after the baby is born if it is a girl.  So, for now, things aren't completely done in there, but I di have everything assembled and washed!  It is going to be a hard day for Zoe when she realizes that the crib is no longer hers!  Everytime I am in the room, she comes in and sprawls out in the crib!

Tonight I invited my family over for dinner.  Lou grilled burgers and hotdogs and we just hung out.  I wanted to have them over for dinner one last time before the baby because I don't know when I will have the energy to make dinner for everyone again!  It might be a while.  Keira had so much fun having everyone around to play with her.  She hung out with Uncle Louie for a while tonight without crying.  She still isn't sure what to think of him!

And of course, there is the never-ending laundry!  It is currently taking over a corner of the dining room because I wanted it out of our bedroom when I cleaned.  So, you will be hearing more about laundry tomorrow as I attempt to get this mountian out of my dining room!!

Scrapfreak Kits!

OK, I know, I'm a blog slacker again!  I realized how much of a slacker I was when I decided that I would post a sneak peek of Scrapfreaks May kit and then I noticed I never posted April debut kit!


So, first off Scrapfreak has made some changes.  They are now an embellishment kit club.  I am so excited about this change.  I have been looking for an embellishment kit for YEARS!  I love to be able to try new things out without having to spend tons of money on a huge package of embellishements.  How many chipboard flowers does one girl need?  In the past I was only able to find an embellishment kit as an add-on to a full paper and embellishement kit that I don't need!  Well, at long last there is a kit out there for people like me!

April was the first month for the embellishment kits, and it is a great kit. 

Introducing the debut kit...

You can find more information on purchasing the kit here!

I have been able to use a few of the kit items over the last couple weeks, and I have to say I LOVE THEM!
Here is a layout I made of my neice Keira making fishy lips.  She is seriously one of the cutest kids EVER.  I already know that she is not going to be able to hide her feelings, her facial expressions give it all away.  It's kind of funny to watch a 6 month old baby look at someone like they just want to tell them how stupid they are though.

For this layout, I used the corrugated alphabet, journal spots, flower centers, rub-ons, plastic flowers, and trim from the kit.  And I still have LOTS of stuff to work with.

For this card I layered the clear acrylic flower and small plastic flowers from the kit.  I have decided that I am in love with the plastic flowers.  This is shocking to me since I am NOT a flower type girl.  Something about the pearlesent plastic flowers is drawing me in!

Now that I have gotten a little bit more up to date, it's time to show a few sneak peeks of May's kit.  If you liked the April kit, you are sure to LOVE the May kit. 

Here is the sneak that is up right now at Scrapfreak.

And here are a couple sneaks at some of the projects I have made with this kit so far.

I can't wait to show the entire kit.  I am so happy with the quality and amount of products.  Be sure to check Scrapfreak on the 25th for the full reveal!  You can find all the details on kit ordering here!  And if you want even more eye candy, check out the sneak peeks on jessica*bree's blog!

My Baby Shower

My mom, Kacie, Stephanie, Andi, and Casey had a baby shower for me last Sunday.  It was tons of fun, but exhausting and a bit overwhelming too.  I can't believe all the gifts I received!  The baby's room is packed full of goodness right now. 
It was nice to see Kelly, Nikki, and Lisa there and get to see how their pregnancies are going too.  I am so excited that there will be so many new babies in the family this year.  I loved growing up with so many cousins that were close in age to me.  I am glad that my baby will get to experience that as well.  Stephanie and I counted and from Sept. 2009 - Oct. 2010 the Lyon family is expecting 6 new babies!  So far the first two born were girls, I'm next and hoping for a boy, Kelly & Dave are thinking about waiting to find out what they are having until the baby is born, and Nikki & Paul and Jaime & Amanda don't have their ultrasounds scheduled yet as far as I know.
When it came time to opening gifts, the kids were all excited to help!  It was nice to have little hands to help when I couldn't reach past my belly, but WOW! that was a lot of help!

Max taking a nap with his Aunt Kimmy.  The shower was exhausting for him too!

Aunt Donna N. and Jake made the baby a blanket and burp cloths with stars and moons on them.  The blankie also has the minky fabric on the back, my favorite.  I'm sure we will be using this A LOT cause Mommy wants to use it too!

Baby's first carseat.  I ended up with two travel systems because of a mix up with taking things off the registry, but Babies R Us gladly gave me a store credit to use when I figure out what else we are needing before the baby is born.

Lucas was really excited to help me open my presents until he realized that there weren't any for him.  The sad look on his face was priceless!

Like I said, I had lots of help with gift opening.  The girls had it down to a science.  Hailey handed the gift to me to open, then I handed it to Rhyan and she handed it to Kadymn.  That way they all got a good look!

When I registered for a baby bath Andi suggested that I register for the one with a sprayer.  She said it would be a lot easier to rinse off the baby that way.  When Lou was loading up the truck after the shower he got a kick out of the fact that our baby has a Soothing Spa Tub!

And of course with my last name, I had to have a lion toy!  Pam and Aunt Karen got the baby the cutest little lion that plays music and his fat little cheeks light up!

Our New Baby (and not the human one yet!)

One night after hanging out with Pond, Lou came home to let me know that we were getting a snake.  This is something we had discussed before since I was going to get him a snake for his birthday last year, so his announcement was fine, I didn't freak out or anything.  The only stipulation to us having a snake is that I didn't want to be around when it was fed, and housing it's food in my home was NOT an option.  While I am not scared of snakes, I am TERRIFIED of rats!

One thing I did not realize at first was how much care a snake requires.  They have very strict heat and humidity requirements to keep them healthy.  It took a little while to get her home ready for her, but once we did, I was really excited to meet her!

So, here she is.  Introducing Miss Chemical Warfare! (I know crazy name, but Lou informed me that when he was a kid he always wanted to name his pet Chemical Warfare, and since you don't call your snake, it finally worked out!)

Here she is investigating Chris' face

One of her favorite things to do is try to climb into the back of the couch.  She's quick too, if you're not paying attention she will be gone!

Lou, Mark Sr., and Chris spent a lot of time working on what I like to refer to as the "Snake Palace" for her.  They built a 4'x2' house for her that takes up a whole wall of the living room.  They did a great job and it's really cool to be able to watch her move around in there. 

Andi brought Rhyan and Taylor over to meet her a few weeks ago.  Rhyan wanted nothing to do with her.  She was fine watching her in her cage, but she had no intentions of touching her.  Taylor on the other hand, this child isn't scared of anything!  She was a little nervous at first since she didn't know how to hold her, but once Lou showed her what to do, she was a pro!

And I took this picture today for the Foto Friday at Scrapfreak to show animals OTHER than the everyday pets.  I like to call this one "Fat Girl in a Little Hide".  When I was buying supplies for her cage, I hadn't met her yet.  I had no idea how big she was and Lou underestimated her size when he was telling me about her.  Needless to say, her hide was a tight fit to begin with, and she has already grown since we got her!  Everytime I watch her slither back under her hide I think of the movie Tommy Boy!

So, that is the newest addition to our home.  Hopefully the next time I blog about a new addition I will be telling you that I finally had this baby!

I'm a bad blogger!

I am a horrible blogger.  I know this.  I have tried a few times to blog more frequently, but every time I fail.  So, after Bree and my mom so lovingly pointed out my poor blogging skills, I will once again try this whole blog thing out!  So, Mom and Bree, it is now up to you guys to help me to keep going!

The Name Game - WTG Challenge #2

It's time again for a challenge from Who's That Girl.  This week's challenge on Who's That Girl is to document a story about your name... it can be why your parents chose your name, how you ended up with a particular nickname or any other name related story.


I scrapped about the spelling of my name.  My mom threw in an extra "e" just to make things confusing!  So, my name is Kimberley rather than the common spelling of Kimberly.  I have become used to everyone misspelling my name, even when I spell it out for them!
 

As if the challenge wasn't a fun enough reason to play, the RAK that Jessica*Bree is offering up this week is AMAZING!  She is offering up these beautiful hand made embellies!

One more this in the Who's That Girl world is our monthly Crafy Idea!  Each month one of the designers will be showing off a crafty idea. While this challenge blog is mainly about scrapping about you, its also about figuring out your style and enjoying this hobby! So we hope the design and technique ideas will help inspire you!  This month Jessica*Bree is going to show you how to make fancy doo-dads. Okay, doo-dads may not be their official name, but this month she is going to be sharing ideas and tips for making your own cute little layered embellies like these:

Check out the blog for a great step by step tutorial!