Amy Ryland Photography: Clouds

These are me looking up turning in a circle taking pictures of the sky from our backyard. I wanted something to remember the magic as I sat with my boy cuddled on my lap, pointing, searching for animals and objects in the clouds. His 2 year old imagination makes my heart swell.

Back to School- Preschool

Sitting up, check. Crawling, check. Sleeping through the night, check. Off the boob and bottle, check. Walking, check. Talking, check. Saying please, thank you, and excuse me without being prompted, check. It seriously amazes me that 2.5 short years ago I was holding a 6 pound baby who cried and cooed and now he is telling me full on imaginative stories and correcting me, "no mom, that's not a skid steer thats a front loader". My baby is turning into a little boy. And though we're not quite ready for preschool with school starting this week it made me think of what is on my to buy list for preschool.

One of these cute backpacks from pb kids. I love the simple design with their name embroidered.

This awesome lunch pail. No baggies needed plus, cute little compartments.

These personalized labels for his sippy cup/water bottle.

These cute tennis shoes. According to the preschools around here they have to wear tennis shoes and I think the velcro is good so he can do them himself.

And of course, new clothes! My favorite places to shop for Corbyn on a budget are The Childrens Place and Old Navy, both have cute boy clothes and awesome sales.

Happy Back to School Shopping!

Back to School- College Edition

I was a ball of excitement and nerves. Every year that I drove onto 2900 Lomaland Dr I was ecstatic thinking about what that year would hold and the memories that would be made but I was also nervous, would my classes be too hard? would I perform as well on the softball field this year as well as I did the year before? would we have an ocean view? will there be a snake hiding under one of our suitcases (it happened)? what surprises would this school year hold? (what can I say I'm a worry wort). But I absolutely loved the energy at the beginning of the year and starting school again. The new notebooks, the organized binders, the smell of new books, and the fact my mom made sure to take me back to school shopping for the essentials even in college. She wouldn't leave my dorm till my bed was made, closet organized, desk set up, food in the fridge, and a few new outfits in the smallest closets ever. If I was going back to school this year, these are some things that would make my list of must haves.

The ipad 2, my husband is using his as his main computer now and I think I would love to take notes and write papers on one of these (and of course, play words with friends).

I hate waking up and waking to that horrid beep, beep, beep is the absolute worst way to start a day, Dave Matthews is far better to wake up to. Plus this one is little and cute and white!

Everyone needs a backpack. Especially this one.

Or a cute tote
A few casual, easy to wear dresses because jeans get a little boring. ps. I knew a girl in college who would only wear dresses and high heels (everyday! for 4 years!) I am not extreme like that but I definitely like me some effortless dresses like this one.

And this one.
And this one.

Along with new clothes you definitely need some new shoes. Point Loma is hilly, most of the time your breathing hard by the time you make it up from the dorms so high heels to me were out of the picture. But these are some adorable shoes that I think would look cute with jeans or casual dresses, score.

And you can't forget the classic flip flop, rainbows are where its at in San Diego.

Happy Back to School shopping!

Home Inspiration: Books

I have started 4 books this year and I have finished, oh, one. My husband is on his 35th book of the year. He is never without a book. He wakes up reading, he goes to sleep reading, he reads at work, he reads while I'm watching tv, he even will read in the shower. His reading obviously has led to a huge collection of books. We have a small library in our house and in his office, as well as, piles of books and I am a person where everything needs a space. Call it anal or type a personality but I get overwhelmed with clutter and I find books cluttery. However, I know they are important to my husband so I am always on the search of how to store books in a pleasing way. Here are a few ways I was looking at for displaying:

Color coordinating =)

Making a usually bland space functional.
Dark walls, thick white shelves, pops of unifying color makes this space interesting to me.
I need to figure this out because even though I only read sometimes I do believe this is true.

This made my day!

I've been fretting! But this just made my day!

Are you ready for some Fooooooooooootballlllllllllll?!!
Oh Peyton, I have missed you!

Childhood Classics

I hang out with teenagers a lot, its kind of my job. And because I hang out with them a lot sometimes I forget how much older I am than them...I am now officially a decade older than my seniors, boo and 15 years older than my youngest students, oh my! The age difference is very obvious when we start talking about our favorite childhood movies, television shows, or music. These are three classics from my childhood that they had never seen.

The Original Parent Trap

Troop Beverly Hills
Punky Brewster

If you haven't seen them, I totally recommend them! If they were also your childhood favorites, go watch again!

I am currently watching The Parent Trap with my teen girls and I can quote almost the whole thing, I must've watched it a ton. And they are enjoying it, though they keep comparing it to the Lohan version, like the Lohan version is the original, haha =)

Vacation Part Three: Ensenada Cruise

I am not spontaneous. I wish I was, but I'm not. Which is why when we decided to book a cruise with our cousins and friends the day after it was mentioned at my brothers wedding (because we had so much fun!), I was so proud of myself. I knew the eight of us would have a fabulous time and we would have a lot of time to just relax and actually talk without having to cut someone off to chase our kiddos but I didn't know I would have a constant stomachache from laughing so hard the entire weekend. Our 3 day Ensenada cruise was so amazing and was just the start to many vacations to come.

The eight!

Where we parked ourselves for most of the trip...top part of the lido deck with the best "views".

Laughter! I love seeing my husband laugh!
The couples:

Me and my Mr.

Jason and Tabitha

Chris and Courtney

Todd and Shawna

The girls

The boys:

Mr. Elephant

And finally, trying to channel the person to the cruise who brought us all together in the first place, my brother and his awesome smile. Love you brother =)