First Day of School

My little baby started school this week.  Big girl, real school.  Daddy & I had a little cry about it the night before.  Daddy was emotional b/c his job keeps him from ever taking, picking up, or even seeing her school.  He also couldn't believe his first born is old enough for big girl school.  I get emotional from pride!  I'm just so darn proud of this girl.  She's already made tons of friends in just 3 days (I've received emails, been stopped in the school, etc from parents saying "my kid won't stop talking about your daughter!").  She's a social butterfly and loving her big girl school environment. 

To celebrate her first day, I had a few ideas in mind but decided to K.I.S.S.  (keep it simple stupid for those that don't remember that being incredibly popular). 

I just propped her up against a brick wall before we left and then asked her questions on the way to school.  The answers, I'm sure, would change from day to day, but the idea is the same.  Every year until she screams back "mom, this is so lame!" I'll ask these questions and take a photo.  Seeing her grow, her dreams, her food desires, and all in between, will be so neat!

You don't have to do much to ahcieve this look!  Some tips --

(1) take photos outside!  It was raining when I took this.  But natural light beats just about anything.

(2) don't bombard them with perfection.  I took 2 quick pics and was done.  If neither was "picture perfect" who cared?  I wanted the real reaction!  Her eyes are big and excited in this picture because she was so excited to have her neon shoes on and start school (she chose these shoes herself b/c they would make her the fastest kid on the playground)

(3) make sure the background is SIMPLE.  A garage door can work too, but those lines are more distracting than you might like.  A front door would work, but you need something wide enough to fit the words on the left or right side.

(4) choose two fonts and just write on top of the photo!  I did mine in photoshop, of course, but picasa (a free google art program) would do the trick just as well!

Back to school time, it's fun! :)  But this waking up early again thing is for the birds!  Here's to sleeping in on Saturday ...

forgive the snoring lady

In a business, keeping up with social media is really important.  And, I suck at it.  BIG time!

Typically I'm just so busy fulfilling orers and my top priority is customer service and shipping my orders out quickly so that fills my time.

But lately, that hasn't been the culprit.  If I'm being totally honest, I've been napping a lot.  What a life right?  Oh, and I went to Puerto Rico with my hunky man and gorgeous kids.

Again, not being totally honest.

Ya see, we've got another human joining the family! :) And we couldn't be happier.

It was actually quite a scary journey as we were told we were going to lose the baby and mommy intuition told me to wait it out.  And what a fighter we have!  Because the baby slowly but surely showed up on ultrasound and is now measuring perfectly on time with a great heartbeat!

So I feel a little bad I've been neglecting parts of my job and that I haven't been designing new things (time to design new things typically goes to time that I now feel sick).  With my previous 2 pregnancies the toilet and I were VERY acquanited (or garbage cans, or just a bag that I could grab fast enough) ... fortunately, the morning sickness is MUCH better with this baby!  Don't know why, but I'll take it!  I still have rough times everyday, but it was literally debilitating with the other two.  Here I was able to actually fly to a gorgeous vacation and two pills helped any queasiness.

Since I haven't been the best blogger / social media business owner, I figured a sale would make make up for it, even if just a little!

The etsy shop recently made it's 10,000th sale.  It was what I originally DREAMED of when my shop started taking off.  I never thought I'd be that lucky.  And I feel SO blessed guys.  SO blessed for my job, for the fact that people come back for seconds and thirds.  I couldn't put in to words how much I appreciate it.

Since new designs are probably going to be a little slower the next few months, enjoy what's there and shop around with a sale!  It's going on until Monday night and discount will automatically be placed at noon today (05.23).

www.laceyfields.etsy.com  <<----- click there and do some shoppin'!

Have an incredible weekend!

Our Pumpkins from the Pumpkin Patch

Halloween was just about as perfect as it gets this year.  The hubby was able to join us, the weather was perfect, the girls really got in to the spirit, and we had tons of plans! :-)

A couple months ago, we asked our older girl what she wanted to be and immediately her answer was "I want G and I to be pumpkins!" 

After buying their costumes (thanks Amazon), we threw them in the closet and didn't even put the outfits together until Halloween ... but guys ... it was a success.  A huge success.  There was so much cuteness that while we were taking photos, multiple people driving by stopped in front of our house to see them.

 (this may or may not be the background on my phone right now ...)

 When they were standing, you noticed the little booties on G more.  They both loved their costumes. "I love Mr. Halloween!  He made G and I in to beautiful pumpkins!"

The hubby always insists we dress up as a family theme, and I just think it's so adorable that he's in to it that much.  He actually had the idea of how to accomplish that with our pumpkin requests...

Look what we found at the pumpkin patch! 

We are pumpkin farmers and had to roll them around in the wheelbarrow b/c those pumpkins were HEAVY! :-)

The girls school had a BIG Halloween celebration so we went to that first.  Then we left early to go to our neighborhoods "trunk or treat" party.  Everyone goes to the pool parking lot and people put games & candy in their trunks. It's tons of fun! THEN, as if those two weren't enough, we did the traditional "trick or treating."

I'm going to say this loud and clear: I MISS the trick or treating from the old days!  The parties are fun, but what ever happened to kids roaming the streets?  I think there is something so nice about seeing your neighbos, getting to know them, ringing on their door bells to say hello.  I know there are safety concerns, but I'm just saying the idea of the neighborhood coming together like that is a beautiful thing. 

After putting the girls to bed, hubby and I went out on our porch with apple cider in tow, and carved the spookiest, Haunted House you've ever seen! :-)

All in all, a fabulous Halloween!  Already excited to celebrate again next year!

What to Wear for Family Photos

A week and a half ago, we got our family photos taken.  I typically stress so much about what to wear for family photos --- how should we dress?  Similarly?  The same colors?  How cohesive?  Oh wait, is that too cohesive? Yeah, you get the point.

Normally I find the girls outfits first.  It's really easy to find cute girl clothing.  But when it comes to the hubby's outfit and my outfit?  I usually just get something boring and the photos look nice, but lackluster.

This year I figured I would do the same as usual, but decided to give it a whirl at Old Navy.  When you have 2 little ones, time isn't exactly easy to come by.  I was able to swing by without kiddos in tow and knew that I had to take advantage.

And, I really lucked out!  Everything below is from Old Navy ... it was great to find the coheisve look that Old Navy had intentionally made as their color pallets, without having to just be "black, white, and jeans" like we typically do.

Here are some tips I've learned:

(1) don't be set on a color palette first.  The stores will kinda dictate what you can do.  Instead, think of the time of year (don't buy the outfits over the summer if you're taking pictures in December, etc)
(2) don't forget Mommy & Daddy!  We always want the kids to look great, but it's important to make sure Mom and Dad look nice too, especially so you'll be able to take a picture with just you two.
(3) I think I prefer it when the girls don't match exactly.  As you can see, the dresses are similar, but not the same.  I like that.  The girls LOVE matching and typically, for an average day, I'm all for that.  But here, the contrast is nice for the photos.

Now I can't wait to see the photos and design our Christmas cards!

Pumpkin Painting Extravaganza

My husband's favorite time of year is fall.  As a result, we've carved pumpkins for over 6 years and had our 3rd annual pumpkin painting extravaganza this weekend!

Each year we have more fun as our girls get to enjoy more and more!

My youngest, G, really had a great time this year --- as you can see.

Bath time. STAT!

For our 3 year old, L, we actually had her give us a work of art this year!  I just took masking tape and made an L with it (for her first AND our last name).  Then I told her to go to town!

Look at that painting pumpkin focus!

One recommendation I have is telling the kiddos to paint in different areas.  If they go over the same area you'll just have an ugly brown pumpkin.  L was patient (which is kinda a miracle) and painted in different areas.  She got to choose the colors and had a blast.  I think out of the three pumpkins, hers was my favorite.

Here's L posing with our masterpieces!  From left to right -- the hubby (boys aren't quite as patient huh? BUT it's actually so cute on a table on our porch!  A simply painted ghost pumpkin is kinda essential).  L's is in the middle and as you can see, it came out just amazing!  I waited about 30 minutes after she was done to remove the tape and it was so crisp.  Mine was the one on the right!

All I did with mine was paint the entire thing white and wait a couple hours.  Then I thought about taping the lines for the chevron but decided --- NO. THANK. YOU!  haha.  This is supposed to be a fun day for us so I just did the Chevron in gold by hand.  I waited 30 minutes and then wrote BOO in a Sharpie marker.  Then I went and painted in black on top of that.  VOILA!  

L's pumpkin is the first one anyone sees when they come to the door and she's just in love with it!

Happy October!