MPMK contributor and professional photographer Kristin is here today sharing easy ways to ensure that you show up in the family photos. As moms, we're often the ones snapping the pics (or sometimes even hiding from the camera), but we need to remember it's such a gift to our kids to make sure they have photographic evidence of these years with you! With Mother's Day around the corner, I wanted to talk about some easy tips on getting into the picture with your kids. As moms, we need to do … [Read more...]
How To Capture Memories with Your Phone While Still Being a Part of Them
Happy Valentine's Day! Since today's all about love, I thought what better to share today than ideas on how best to document all of those loving (also funny, exasperating, etc.) moments we experience as parents. When I stumbled upon the description of Kristin Roger's The Inspired Home photography course, I was instantly smitten. As a mother in the trenches, I find her approach so very appealing, "fundamental yet inspiring topics related to photography, home life, and managing it all with joy … [Read more...]
DIY: Photo Valentine Favors
It's that time of year again - time for the kiddos to get creative and show some love to their classmates... and possible neighborhood buddies, family members, etc. Kristin's here today sharing her template for personalized favors - a simple trick for producing something fancy with minimal effort. We're also debuting something new this week - questions of the day. Today we want to know: do your kiddos share Valentines with family or just classmates? Share your tradition in our comments … [Read more...]
How to Store Your Digital Photos Like the Pros Do
One of the things I've been dying to tackle with Project Organize Your ENTIRE Life is digital photo storage. I have thousands (maybe even tens of thousands? I'm not sure - I'm too scared to look) of photos currently on my computer. Not at all organized, not even a little. I just haven't been sure how to go about it. Then it hit me... I have some stellar professional photographers on my team, why not ask them how they do it? So today MPMK's own professional photog Kristin is here doing just … [Read more...]
DIY Personalized Alphabet Book
I first gave you a glimpse of the personalized alphabet book I made for C here. He liked the initial inexpensive flip version so much that I decided to make a hard cover copy for his last birthday. Today I thought I'd share it, in it's entirety, in case you'd like to attempt something similar. It can be surprisingly hard to think of something that's salient to your child for each letter - I'm hoping sharing my picks might help. Please enjoy and let me know if you have any … [Read more...]
Check those Christmas Thank You Notes Off Your To-Do List
Taking a break from the blog's birthday celebration today to share these simple DIY photo thank you notes. I've seen fill-in-the-blank cards like these all over the web. While they certainly looked like they'd cut our note writing time in half, they also seemed a bit impersonal. Not that I think any of our friends and family are expecting a full length letter from my tots - maybe just more than three or four words. My solution was to add a photo of the kids playing with each … [Read more...]
Christmas Card Look Book for Babies and Toddlers
I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! I'm still spending time with visiting family (as I'm sure many of you are as well) but I wanted to pop in and quickly re-post an idea I had last year. I get a little sad having to take down all the Christmas stuff and this is one way I've found to extend the magic a little longer... I'm always torn this time of year about exactly what to do with all the lovely Christmas cards we've accumulated. I feel bad throwing them out but I'm also … [Read more...]
Jazzing Up Your Photos with Sidewalk Chalk
We're FINALLY having professional family photos taken next weekend and I'm so excited! (There is a small chance it might not happen due to C developing a very persistent stye in his eye - of course - but I'm sticking my head firmly into the sand and moving forward with haircuts, outfit selection, and the like as if everything will go off without a hitch.) I found this wonderful photographer through a question/comment she left right here at MPMK. As shoot time approaches, we've been … [Read more...]
A “Manly” Photo Project for Father’s Day
I already lamented earlier this week about the hard time I had coming up with a good Father's Day gift last year. In the end I was successful, read all about it here, but a whole year has gone by and I'm having the same problem. I always seem to default to a photo gift of some sort. Maybe it's because my kids are still so young that they change A LOT from year to year and I like to give the hubs mementos of how small they once were. This year I'm once again going the photo route … [Read more...]