Time {A Bigger Picture Moment}

August is approaching, wait it’s already here! Its fast arrival has only made me realize how fast time is flying by! Soon my boys will be approaching their 4th and 2nd birthdays and party planning will be in the works! As fun as party planning is and all the fun holidays that come with the arrival of fall and winter, I still get overwhelmed with the things cluttering our lives…from the merciless bills and unending daily chores to the trivial TV shows that we have convinced ourselves in to thinking we can’t miss! When I think about all these things crowding our lives a little quote one of my facebook friends shared once comes keeps hovering in my mind:



"I believe that the greatest trick of the devil is not to get us into some sort of evil but rather have us wasting time." - Donald Miller, 'Blue Like Jazz'


I could go on and on about this, but I’m just going to leave it at the quote…it sure makes ME think and think often about the bigger picture in MY life. Maybe it will resonate with you somewhere I your life. Make you think about the bigger picture in your life.

{Time that is never wasted; Time with my boys}

 

Written in participation with the Bigger Picture Moments, where we breathe in and find the beauty of

the bigger picture. You can read more bigger picture moments over at Hyacynth's blog, Undercover Mother, where this weeks link up can be found and you can share your own moment.

A morning read...

This week I set out to get some pictures for the "around the house" theme over at mortal muses and decided to get some pictures of this little red book I found at a flea market. It has no special meaning nor is it a famous or classic book, I just like it.

I love its faded red color...

I love how the corners are  starting to fray...

I love that it smells old ...

and I just love how it looks setting on the self of my curio cabinet among the other books. 

If you want to join in on the fun over at Mortal Muses head on over, its a wonderful site! They also have a group pool over on Flickr!

I also sent this on over to Sweet Shot Tuesdays, since I just happen to love how these turned out and so far, they are my favorite this week!

Have a great day!
Brooke

This is who I am {For the love of prints}

I recently discovered Christina over at Divas and Dreams Photography Blog and her free creative workshop...The workshop is on its fourth assignment, however, she has set it up so that you can join in at the current assignment or go back and start from the beginning. She is leaving the linky for the assignments up on each assignment post. So, the current assignment is all about celebrating prints, the actual product of our creativity that we can actually hold in our hands, not just look at on computer screens. As part of the assignment we are to take a photo of a print and then for the written part of the assignment we are to write about prints and how we feel about them. So now that you are caught up, on with my results! Oh, but first a link the the workshop, This is who I am...

I picked these prints because they were some of the first I took with my new "fancy" camera and the precious little one just happens to be my nephew. Making these prints the first newborn photos I had ever taken that were not my own children!

I love getting my photos printed off, although here lately I am guilty of NEVER getting around to it! I scrapbook as well as dabble in photography and have album upon album of photos and sleeves upon sleeves of printed photos that are waiting to be scrapbooked! There is something about physically holding your work in our hands, its nice to turn pages in albums and shuffle through a stack of photographs. Now I just need to make it a point to get those photos in waiting in a book and move onto my newest stuff. However, I might just be buying simple photo albums from now on and put scrapbooking on the shelf.

One more photo...it is not of a print, but just a new picture of my handsom nephew. I took the pictures in my photograph when he was two weeks, he is now 5 months! Isn't he adroable?

Have a great day!
Brooke

A Cherry on top!

Ok  ok ok, I know I said I was taking a quick break, but so many wonderful things and creative projects just keep happening! So, I've decided to just put my blogging in a little time slot on my schedule and take advantage of my night owl genes. Anyway, on to the point of this post. Friday I was reading some comments from my fellow bloggers and under one of my post I got a link from Kristin over at The Freebird Photoblog saying tag your it. She was passing along this sweet little award along to me!

Isn't she sweet? I was truly surprised and honored to be included in her list blogs to pass along this sweet little award to! If you haven't been over to Kristin's blog you should go see her, she has a lovely blog with amazing pictures that always have the most beautiful tones and color effects!

Thank you so much Kristin for thinking of me! You sure know how to make a girl happy!

The rules of this decadent award are to:

 1. Thank the person who gave the award to you

 { As I did above, oh I'll do it again, Thanks Kristin!}

2. Copy the award and put it on your blog

{You can see it up there on top, isn't it cute?}

3. List three things about you {Oh my let's see...}

1. I dream of travel and see my little family filling up some passports in the future {well if they still have the old fashion kind then they would be full}. Greece, Australia and Africa are definitely on the list!
2. Although I dream of travel and exploring the world, I would be just fine with a secluded little cabin decorated just the way I wanted, with a beautiful garden full of flowers and veggies, a huge pasture full of wildflowers, my handsome little boys giggling and playing and me and the hubby watching them from the porch.
3. I absolutely loathe dishes and can't wait until the plumber gets here Monday to install my shiny black dishwasher!

4. Post a photo that you love{There are so many!}

Happy Birthday Pierce!

There are my most recent set of photos I love...They are of a balloon release in honor of a little guy who earned his angel wings last year, we were not able to join Pierce's mommy and daddy along with the rest of our family so we held our own private release at the same time, just a different town. The day we did this it would of been his 3rd birthday...I love these photos because they remind me to cherish every moment with my boys and remind me to continually pray for Pierce's mommy and daddy and the healing of their broken hearts! True it is sad, but yet it is beautiful in the way his short little life taught us so many valuable lessons and continues to do so! He has touched many hearts and if you'd like to read about his story you can here...

And last on the list...

5. Tag five people you want to pass this award on to:

This is the hardest part! As Kristin had stated in her shout out to me, I am a new blogger, therefore so new to this blog world! There are so many wonderful blogs out there and many of my favorites have already received this award, like Corinne at Trains, Tutus and Teatime and Maureen over at Cottage 960. Naturally, I would just send this right back to Kristin for The Freebird Photoblog since it is so wonderful! So, here are my choices, I don't know if they have already received this or not but they are my choices anyway!

1. Hyacynth at Undercover Mother-She has beautifully written post, that as a mother, I can relate to most of the time. She is also one of the wonderful ladies behind The Bigger Picture Moment blog.

2. Sherrie from Search for Serenity-An extraordinary lady who's blog is full of beautifully expressed emotions and amazing photos! She really has a way with textures and post processing, and I am in love with her photography!

3. Abby over at A Feathered Nest-I have had this blog in my favorites list long before I gathered the courage to start my own blog and before I started my photography up again. I have been following her for some time now, just not officially until recently. She is one crafty momma and always has amazing pictures to go along with her step by step instruction. I used her directions to make a baby gift once!

4. Darrah Parker Photography-She takes amazing portraits and has a wonderful blog packed with tiny slices of life! She also host the "Slice of Life Tuesdays" Flickr group.

Last on my list, only because I can't keep on adding more or I'd never get to post this to my blog:

5. My good friend Valerie Mellema, we go back to grade school and girl scouts and rekindled through facebook, she has her blog Writing Through Life One Day at a Time and her photoblog Photosuwant.

Again, a big THANK YOU to Kristin for passing along this award!