Enjoying our Summer

Here are some pictures of what we've been up to lately. :) We are thoroughly enjoying our summer! The temperatures have been in the 100's every day this week. Yesterday it was 107 and most days it's been about 103. There is high humidity that makes it feel even hotter! But I'll take it over a cold winter ANY DAY!!! At least there is sun! :)

My friend Suzi's beautiful baby girl :)

Jess and I on her birthday at Hula Hut. My face was so swollen that day cause we were outside and it was pretty hot!

Playing in my friend Cassie's kiddie pool.

See the size of it? Cassie and I fit in there too with the kids to cool off every few minutes because we were so hot! :)

Next week we leave for our anniversary trip to the beach! I am so excited I can't even contain myself! I'm sure I'll be posting lots of pictures of that when the time comes! Right now I'm just getting all my laundry done before we leave. :)

Photography

Here are a few pictures I snapped quick after my photography class last night. I LOVE how the sky looks at about 9:00pm at night!

The building that our class is in--It's very old.

The UT tower is what we see right when we walk out of the building

Family Time

My brother-in-law Adam is here for a few weeks on leave from Iraq. We've been spending time together as a family the past few days while we can. Here are some things that we've done!

Took a fun trip down to the River Walk. I've been there so many times but I always enjoy it!

We stopped here to take pictures and it was a hot spot for some reason! There was no breeze through there at all and we were sweating when we were done and all practically ran to the mall for cool air. :)

Joanna and I are pregnant together again! This time there is about 4 months between us, instead of 6. She's 2 months and I'm 6 1/2.

I'm LOVING using everything that I'm learning in my class to take some great pictures! Knowing how to have my camera in manual and change several settings really makes a difference!

We stopped in a CVS for some drinks and Brookie was climbing up and down these stairs. She has a thing with stairs--she loves them!

We went to the zoo with the kids and afterwards came back to Joanna's for lunch. The little girls were playing the piano together, having so much fun!

Walk-A-Thon

Brookie completed her mile walk-a-thon to raise her money for clubs! She raised more than she needed! :) I was sick and didn't get to go with her so of course I was extremely disappointed, but Nate took her and said she did great! The picture makes it look like it was a hot desert out there, but the trail was paved and well shaded and Brooke kept saying it was, "pretty".


Afterwards Daddy took her out for a smoothie which she guzzled right up. He was so sweet and brought me home one too!

I just wanted to end with this picture of my two loves in the pool the other day. Around here there is not much to do besides swim, so we've been doing a lot of that! At least going to the pool a few times a week! Brookie is getting a nice Italian tan--thankfully she inherited the nice olive skin-tone--thanks Nonnie and Poppy! :)

(She looks like she wasn't having fun, she just didn't want to take time away from her duckies to take the picture :)

I'm a School Girl Again...

...at least for one month!! I am sooooooooooo extremely excited to be attending the University of Texas (woo hoo) for a photography class! This picture of our class was taken with our teachers amazing camera, but more amazingly, his awesome wide angle lens and his knowledge of how to set his camera's white balance and ISO to make us look great! I'm learning how to do it and soon I'll be an old pro! I hope! :) Just wanted to share! I hope you see an improvement in my pictures soon. Next week we are meeting in the courtyard and shooting for 2 hours and 1 hour of teaching at the end.
I am ecstatic!!!!
My teacher is kneeling in front of me. He is super smart, very funny and entertaining and so knowledgeable! He captureed my attention the entire 3 hours with no break and the time flew by.
I'm so blessed that my hubby provided for me to go to this class to further my dreams of becoming a wedding photographer someday!

Baby #2, Month Six :)

Here I am starting my 6th month of pregnancy. Everything is going great! I feel awesome--God is so good to me! I am feeling the baby move more and more and the heartbeat is strong. Nothing much has changed this month. I'm measuring right at 24, right where I should be. Oh, I guess the only thing that has changed is I've been craving ice cream--mainly chocolate- and I'm not an ice cream person normally! I've gotten it from Culvers twice in the past few weeks! Still trying to keep that weight in check so I can't let myself go crazy. :)

I've been finding great sales on fall boy clothes at nice places like Gap so I've been buying them up. He already has about 4 pairs of shoes too. :) I'm having fun! I love being pregnant!

Newest Photo Props

I've been wanting little blocks with letters on them for a while now. There are so many cute shots you can do with blocks and cute pregnant Mommies and precious little newborns! I found a whole box of them for $1.00 today at a garage sale. Needless to say I was very excited! There is a whole slew of us pregnant right now so I will be doing a lot of pregnancy pictures in the coming months. Yay!

All Grown Up!

Before she went into clubs for the first time Wednesday night. She get's extra points for bringing her Bible and offering. :)

At our church, once the kids turn two, it's no more nursery for them! They get to go to Master Clubs on Wednesday nights and Sunday School on Sunday morning. Sunday night they sit with their parents in church. I admit I was a little nervous about sending Brookie to clubs with all the "big kids". The age group she's in is 2-3 year olds, but all the kids are 3, going on 4. In about 6 months she will have several little girls (all her buddies :) come in there with her. But, she LOVED it! She colored and made a craft and sang songs and started learning her memory verse. She came home saying, "I love Clubs!" and has been talking about it ever since. When I asked her about it she kept saying, "shhh, quiet, shhh quiet" cause they must have been telling her that the whole time!

She's also been singing songs all the time and very loud which she makes up. :) I can't believe that it was such a short time ago that I put her in the infant nursery, then toddlers and now she's a little club member!

Who doesn't Love a Great Deal?

I have to share something that I just recently heard about!
It's this GREAT website called Saving with Shelly! The link for it is here. It's so worth it to go there and browse around. You can find coupon savings for all kinds of grocery items, but it's way better than other sites I've used. This one actually tells you the stores that you can find the great deals at!

For instance:

Click on the Target link, and you will find all kinds of deal like this:
Kashi Frozen Waffles - $1.99-
Use $1.50/1 Kashi coupon
Final Price = $.29

In her original posting she has the link for the printable coupon right there so you can just click on it--so easy and convenient!

Also,
Hershey’s Bliss Candy Bar - $.99-
Use $1/1 Target coupon
Final Price = FREE
Who doesn't love a good piece of chocolate for FREE???

WALMART:

Bar S Hot Dogs (12oz) - $.50-
Use $1/2 Bar S coupon
Final Price = FREE

Blue Bunny Large Single Serve Ice Cream Sandwiches - $1-
Use $1/1 Blue Bunny coupon
Final Price = FREE

At some Wal Marts, they have 4 rolls of Cottenelle toilet paper for $1.00. On this site you can find a $1 off coupon, so it's FREE! Stock up on tiolet paper for the whole year! :)

Again, all the links for coupons are included on her site! This is great girls, we can save a lot of money each week! There are a lot of other stores listed on there as well so check it out. I know a lot of my readers are from NY and there are no Tops or Wegmans on there, but like you just saw she has Target and WalMart, plus Walgreens and CVS.

Hope you get over there to check it out! Lots of awesome savings, and who doesn't love a great deal?