jodified

I love Friday nights and I'm not even sure why b/c they all are the same. Pizza, a movie and my laptop. Chris usually goes to bed early b/c he's exhausted from the week or he goes out to some kind of soccer event, like tonight, and I'm working feverishly to catch up from the week of kids. So it's not exciting, by any means, but I still love it.

It also means I get to sleep a bit longer b/c C will wake up with the kids in the morning and it usually means I have a shoot at some point, maybe two, and get to meet or reunite with great families! I guess it is the welcome wave to Saturday and I love Saturdays.

SO here I sit, waiting patiently for Grayson to stop crying and my pizza+soda to arrive. The girls are sleeping and Chris is gone.

And I'm FINALLY going to start the Handmade Christmas posts coming!

So without further ado…

Handmade Christmas Project #1:  Puzzle Decor

We lose puzzle pieces as often as we lose socks and it drives me crazy. I'm constantly searching high and low for a piece and usually end up throwing the puzzle away only to find the darn piece the next day! That's when I got this idea… to take the old puzzle and make something cute with it!

THIS GIFT IS FOR SAM… so Abbie, if you want to be surprised stop reading!

This was a fairly cheap alphabet puzzle that I got at the second hand store when Bailey was a baby. All I did was gently pull the top wood layer off the bottom layer… I had to work it really slowly so it wouldn't snap! Then all I did was glue pieces of scrapbook paper to the back and hot glue a ribbon to hang it with! SO EASY! AND CHEAP!

One thing I would have done differently should I do it again… I would paint the frame white first to cover up the puzzle brand in the bottom left corner. Hopefully Samantha won't mind!

It literally took me all of 30 minutes to complete and I think it turned out pretty cute!

You could do this with any puzzle but I love the alphabet… I want to do one for the playroom next… maybe I'll finish it before Christmas!

AND, if you want a cute handmade gift but don't have the time or energy to do it yourself… consider having the sweetest young college student make a handmade bracelet for you!

ABBIE, JESSICA, ANGIE M, TERRI and MOM STOP READING RIGHT NOW or you will RUIN part of your CHRISTMAS!!!

Our sweet friend Kelsey is making these bracelets for $5 each! And she will ship ANYWHERE! Just shoot me an email with how many you want, your address and the size (child, adult, etc.) and she will get one done asap!

Isn't that so stinkin cute? Oh my gosh! I got one for myself, one for my sister, two for my friends, my MIL and mom and one for each of my girls! Perfect for the little ladies in your life!

OR, in the spirit of giving, feel free to rip off the idea and do it yourself to save the $5!

You all have T-4.5 hours until the Croc giveaway is CLOSED so make sure you comment and try to win!

Oh pizza, the baby is sleeping now (only 5 trips to plug him with the paci while writing this!) and I need my mnt. dew fix… hurry pizza man, hurry!

And to leave you tonight… a few shots from today of my sweet and chunky baby boy!

Fat baby, post bath, love it!

What mom doesn't love Crocs? I mean seriously. We have numerous pairs from the cute pink maryjanes to the blue solid clog style to the basic kind you can decorate. Parker still tries to wear them everyday even though it's freezing b/c they're the only shoes she can put on by herself. WE LOVE CROCS.

And I bet you do too!

So to start my favorite day of the week off right I'm doing a GIVE AWAY!

Oh yes, you heard that right! A wonderful person straight from Crocs, Inc. contacted me about sending me two pairs of Kids Mammouth Crocs for the girls to try! We chatted and decided that a give away would be fun too! And b/c I know we're going to love the new Crocs I'm going to do the giveaway today rather than wait until we get ours!

SO today I am giving away a pair of THESE:

Are you dying? In whatever size you need! Don't they look cozy? I might have to get a pair for myself HERE or maybe THESE too!

SO. What can I make you do to earn these awesome shoes? Hmmm.

Leave a comment ON THIS POST telling me your Christmas wish. Are you wishing for your favorite perfume? A day at the spa? A handmade gift from your kids? More time? World peace? What are you wishing for?  And if you can guess why today is my favorite day of the week I'll throw in a special treat of my own! A little Jodified holiday decoration I'm making this year!

And I'm not doing a random generator or anything… this is my blog and so I'm hand picking the winner! I won't play favorites, I'm going to pick the wish that I wish I could grant. SO be honest people! Who knows, maybe there's someone out there that could grant your wish that's reading this!

Are you SO excited??? NEW CROCS! For FREE! Gotta love Crocs! Thanks Stephanie at Crocs who contacted me about this giveaway!

Oh yes. Thursday is looking GOOD!

PS… COMMENTS WILL BE CLOSED FRIDAY AT MIDNIGHT and the WINNER will be posted Saturday!

I try to do things in order… remembering who had what first so the girls don't fight all the time, editing my shoots in the right order and posting images in the right order. I also try to do what I promise, like posting Janel and Adam's engagement photos today since I said I was going to do them yesterday. But then life happens and it all gets out of whack. I have a fussy baby all night so I don't finish the engagement sneak peeks like I'd hoped, I don't answer emails timely sometimes, I get behind on some edits, etc.

Anyway, life happened yesterday in the form of one little girl's birthday and rather than work all day we did art projects and visited with their great grandparents and went out to dinner. It was a great day but work got shoved to the back burner and there it still sits, just waiting for the house to be quiet with sleeping babies giving me time to work. Hopefully that will happen this afternoon but I won't get my hopes up b/c it didn't happen yesterday. Did I mention that my parents are out of town all week? Great for them (happy anniversary today mom+dad!) but it means I'm with the kids more than usual.

ANYWAY! I have clients all over town waiting on me and I want to say a BIG FAT thank you for being so patient! I have NOT forgotten about you, you just hired a mom with three young kids and I'm working as fast as possible!

So in the theme of being out of order, I want to share some photos from last month when we went to the All Saints Episcopal Church Consecration. All Saints is the church my dad's company built this year and we couldn't be more proud of him! Enjoy some photos (this is mainly for family+friends that are dying to see his church)!

We left the big girls with GoGo and Bubba that day and the babies came (the church is about an hour away)… doesn't Gray look cute in his sweater vest?

I love capturing moments like this! THIS is what this job is all about for me!

I love this shot of The Bishop!

 I love this one of Sam! OMGosh! Look at those eyes!

Sam was being SO loud and this was Abbie's solution!

My parents invited some friends and family to come and in the photo above it's my dad and his Aunt Betty… I love her and it makes me so happy I caught her on film!

I took photos throughout the entire build and as a gift my parents had me create a book documenting the year… my dad presented it at the Consecration.

Look at how proud my dad looks as Sam is getting blessed by the Bishop!

We're all so proud of my dad, it's amazing to be the builder of a church. To put the walls up around a space that is devoted to worshiping the Lord, such a privilege.  

And to get a tad bit back on track I'm working feverishly on edits+design work today. Grayson just fell asleep and I have 40 minutes before I have to get Bailey. Can you edit an entire shoot in 40 minutes? I haven't yet but there's always a first time for everything right?

Hope your Wednesday is a good one!

Said by a very happy bride on Sunday b/c I brought good weather to her shoot! It had nothing to do with my actual skills as a photog mind you, but I'm going to pretend like it did!

Yesterday I had the extreme pleasure of photographing a gorgeous bride down by the Arch, a spot I've been dying to shoot at and MAN did it live up to my expectations! The best part of this particular bride is that she found me by just reading my blog… gotta love blogs!

Janel and Adam have the sweetest story… they met online at eHarmony and fell instantly in love. Or at least pretty much instantly! You'll have to hop over to their blog HERE to read their whole story. Anyway, they are having a destination wedding and aren't having professional photos taken on their special day (which is on a CRUISE in paradise!) so instead they hired me to do bridal photos of Janel in her dress and then also some engagement shots. It was so much fun! I had a few different spots I wanted to hit so Janel's mom came along to watch+drive and her sister met up with us too. We did her bridals and then while she changed in a restaurant bathroom down on Laclede's Landing, Adam hightailed it down there to meet us before we lost the sun completely.

I'm doing two posts tonight for their sneak peeks b/c Adam is banished from my blog (not that he was a loyal reader anyway I bet!) until the wedding so he doesn't see her in her dress… but she can bring up just the individual post of the two of them to show him those photos! I'm even burning them two disks so he never has a chance to see her!

So first is the beautiful Janel… open to whatever crazy shot I proposed and willing to literally walk through mud to make me happy! HA!

So that heart totally said "Christine" before my little bit of photoshop magic! Don't worry Janel, there is a plain heart on your disk too! I just thought this was too funny!

Oh wait, I mean, I'm totally cool and brought spray paint with us and did that myself!

*and notice above her in black paint, it says "Merry Christmas"! How perfect!

One of my absolute favorite photos to date. I love this.


Can you believe the tourists cleared out so I could take this photo? And without me even asking!

This photo is incredibly grainy and really one I should have trashed, but I just love it anyway! Don't print this one too large Janel!

Her sweet sister had these awesome glasses on and Janel was all about them! I love that I made it into this shot!   Didn't she ROCK these?



I love this arrow! Hello Bride!

And what you don't see is that staring at Janel to my direct right while taking this photo was a man in a homeless camp! Oh yes, I made her go to some sketchy places (we were safe! don't worry!)! But check out the next photo and you'll understand why I love going off the beaten path!

I just love that in b/w!

So random! We both loved that sculpture! Anyone know where we were???

See? I told you I made her walk through mud! Luckily she had on yoga pants and tennis shoes the whole time! Bet you couldn't tell could you?

So give her some love (all bride want to hear how gorgeous they are!)… and I'll be back later with their engagement sneak peek!

Thanks again Janel, you were awesome!

he would first mention how late he got to sleep today, which was 8:45am, because the girls went to their grandparents house. Then he might mention our "date" last night. And in mentioning our date, which was dinner with the kids and his parents (really good food! thanks B+T!) and then going to my parents empty house to sit by the fire to be romantic but save money, he would have to tell you that in line at Oberweis for a shake I actually said, "sometimes I just wish I could order a large shake. I mean, I want a bucket of chocolate shake right now!"  Then he would assuredly mention that between Oberweis and my parent's house I asked him to go to QuickTrip so I could get pretzels and a Mnt Dew also. Or maybe he'd mention that not only did I go into QT in my slippers but that I had spilled shake down the front of me. Or, you know, he might just risk death and go ahead and call me a fat ass!

We were laughing so hard last night at my multiple food stops but if I was going to have a night, or an hour and a half b/c Gray screamed the entire time and literally giggled when I came home and rescued him, away from our kids I wanted all my favorites with me! But it was funny! And we kept saying how if we were dating I would never have admitted how much food+drink I wanted! Especially after eating a really good Italian dinner, which I wouldn't have finished if we were just dating as to not look like a fat girl. Sometimes I really love being married!