20 Things About Myself at 23 (Part I)

I'm not sure if I've ever really listed out 20 things about myself on my blog, apart from blog awards, and I've seen it in the blogosphere as well as on Instagram.  So here is part one :)

1. I got married when I was 21 to a great man, Ryan, while he was in the Marine Corps.  During that time, I experienced the end of a deployment while we were dating, and Ryan was deployed to Afghanistan for almost our entire first year of marriage.  Right now we're in our third year (2.5 years down), but we're still learning a lot about each other, our habits, effective communication, and how to be better partners.

2. I was baptized a Catholic but was re-baptized as an adult, a few months ago, at my new church home.  Declaring a church home has always been something really important to me.  Growing up, I was very much Catholic, but as I got older, I didn't really agree with a lot of the religious doctrine.  It was much more than a time of, "I don't want to follow these rules." Instead, I personally felt that it wasn't a good fit for me or what I truly believe in and support.  I came to realize this more and more as I attended other worship services and realized how much more open these services were and people developed a relationship with God far more than I saw in Catholic services.  In my Catholic family and community, it kind of felt like there was more emphasis on doing things a certain way, instead of living in God's name.  When I went to Great Falls Christian Community for the first time, everything just seemed to click and I love it there.

3. I love dogs.  I have ever since I was a little kid when I would go to the library and check out volumes of books on dogs to learn more about breeds.  One summer, while babysitting, I put together a folder of print outs of different dog breeds.  Probably around that time was when my family got a yellow labrador and it kind of made me realize that my mom and I had very different outlooks on how we thought a dog should be a part of the family.  My parents had an amazing kennel built for our dog that had indoor/outdoor access and it was pretty cool.  However, our dog never was really in the house with us and for me, that was pretty sad.  When I met Ryan and his family, it was a 180.  His mom has three labs and they all are such a big part of the family.  I knew that when Ryan and I got dogs, it would be the same.  I really love having our dogs be indoor dogs and they're like our kids.  Holly and Blu are so spoiled but I don't think I'd have it any other way.

4. I am addicted to Instagram.  Hands-down, it's my most favorite of social media outlets.  I love seeing a snapshot of people's lives, especially awesome people who love to craft, or are awesome parents, or just create really beautiful photos.  The Instagram accounts I follow always inspire me, either with crafting or spiritually in developing my relationship with Jesus.  I need to put together a list of awesome Instagrammers to follow ;)

5. I have been compared to Leslie Knope, and I love it.  In case you don't know who Leslie Knope is, then we can be best-friends.  I'm just kidding...sort of.  She's Amy Poehler's character in the show, Parks and Recreation.  She is hilarious and Mindy Kaling confirmed that she is awesome (she is a writer/actress in The Office).  Leslie Knope has the type of spirit and energy that is intoxicating and contagious- it just spreads to everybody else.  Awhile ago I wrote a really long, really depressing blog post about how I greatly disliked the town that my duty station is located in.  All I could see were the problems and what it was lacking.  Now I can't ignore those things, but I can definitely spin an alternative outlook on it and so I've started thinking more positively.  I try to be an influence for good at work, with my friends, and at home.  I'm enthusiastic about life and I try to bring that to other people to brighten their day.

Part II is coming up!

If you liked this post, share it with others! If you feel particularly moved by it, leave a comment because I love feedback and discussion. Social media links are provided below and thanks for reading!

Instagram and I are like Facebook Official

I have a huge lady crush on Beyonce and if this picture doesn't automatically make you think of motherhood swagger, I just don't know what will.

My guest post is up on Autumn's blog today and you guessed it, it's about B.

The lady is one helluva class act and you can find out what life lessons we can learn from the woman who runs the world and there may even be an Oprah quote or two.

Now back to this jolly ol' post.  

I have mad love for Instagram.  I was thinking about this the other day and I would go as far as to say that it's my favorite form of social media.  I don't know about you, but I can tolerate a person through their life captured in images versus dialogue on their Facebook and sometimes on their blog.   "Tolerate" might be a strong word to use there, especially since most of the accounts I follow on Instagram are of people that I want to follow.  For me there's an art to Instagram and you don't necessarily have to a good writer or the best photographer, you just need to capture moments of your life.  I just love seeing a life captured in i n d i v i d u a l moments.  There's something very real and genuine about it.  You can throw a filter on a picture with text and doodles, but it's still a memory frozen in time.

For me pictures can tell so much about a life.  They capture moments of friendship, love, and entertainment.  I know people tease others so much about those food shots, but in that moment we appreciate the blessing of food so much that we take a picture of that tasty sammich because we are excited.  This might be stretching it, but in a broader sense it's a celebration of appreciating what we have in our life.  We appreciate moments of hilarity with friends and we take a picture.  We appreciate quotes enough to take a screen shot and share it on Instagram or save it on our phones.  We appreciate the hard work of others and click that "like" button to add another heart to that picture.

I recently opened my Instagram up to the public because I like to share my photos and that can't necessarily be done with hashtags if an account is set to private.  I've really enjoyed that decision because I've met other Instagram users, like avid readers through the hashtags #bookstagram and #booknerd.  It's silly, but at the same time, I meet people who share my same interests and it's faster than searching through blogs.  I can also appreciate what they share through their pictures.  This decision has also caused me to explore other Instagram accounts, ones that I definitely didn't follow prior to opening up my account.  It also gives me an appreciation for each person and what they share.

Ever since I've been in tech school for the military, I've been struggling with how my body has been reacting physically to the stress and schedule changes.  I've gained weight and lost tone, and it's the first time in my life that this has been "this bad."  It's been a really frustrating process because I have a strong core from years of athletic work but it looks squishy.  I also don't fit into the clothes that I wore in college and boy howdy has that been a nightmare.  I actually hate how I look in my clothes now and that, plus our lack of funds for more new clothes, has been pressuring me to get rid of these love handles and excess squish.  I've been incorporating a healthier diet but it's been difficult to maintain patience with this.  After I opened my account, I started following several fitness Instagrammers and people who went from average to really toned.  They often share recipes and fitness tips on their accounts and if nothing else, they share pictures of their kick-ass progress.  It's incredibly inspirational and everyday I have the opportunity to simply open up Instagram and right away, I have several pictures to inspire me to hit the gym and work really hard. 

With that, I can share my own progress.  With hashtags like #TIUbikiniseries and #instafit, I open up the opportunity for other people who are working out and sharing their progress to see the pictures that I share.  Importantly, it holds me accountable for working out and sticking with the goals that I want to achieve.  Seeing other people's progress and their willingness to share actual weight numbers and clothing sizes has also been pretty awesome.  I was a 0-2 from high school through college and it's made me realize that I can be a bigger size and still be incredibly fit.  I feel like my body is adjusting to being a woman and I've got hips and an ass that only gets bigger with the more squats I do. That can't be helped and it's ok because my body is strong, flexible, and the human body in general is pretty sweet.

With Instagram, I can also share the things that I'm interested in, whether it's a product, quote, or something on a blog.  My name is Kimberly and I am a Disney addict.  Two of the selected pictures above are Disney-related.  However, with sharing pictures I can show my friends and family the things that I've been thinking about.  A few weeks ago I was struggling with living at our current station because I'm not the biggest fan of the "city" which is incredibly small.  During that time, I was on alert and really wanted to go to Disney World so I ordered multiple Disney vacation planning DVDs.  When they came in the mail, I may or may not have squealed with delight.  The same type of squeal that I emitted when I saw that Build-a-Bear has a Sully!  Of course, our nearest Build-a-Bear is four hours away.  If anyone wants to send him to me, that would seriously make my summer :P  These things bring little shots of joy and happiness.  They just cheer me up.  I also love memory-keeping and journaling.  I bought a 10-year everyday journal because I love the concept of capturing daily moments with a sentence or few sentences.  With this journal I can go back and look at what I did that day.  I think this will be particularly awesome when I'm 33 and I can see what I was thinking about the same day when I was 23 :)  These types of concepts I share on my Instagram and I really want to bring that more to my blog.  I think this type of post will help greatly with that vision.

Source//Source//Source

 I really enjoy the diversity of accounts that I follow, whether it's a friend from back home or favorite celebrities.  Elle McLemore, who plays Holly Truman on Army Wives as well as was an actress in the Bring it On the Musical, is one of my favorite accounts.  We oddly enough have a lot in common, especially our extensive love for all things Disney.  Nevertheless, accounts like hers and fellow bloggers just cheer me up.  I love to see the things they share and it's just fun.  I also like seeing funny memes, quotes, and like I stated above, products that I think I would enjoy.  The act of sharing those can pay that emotion forward, and bring joy or laughter to someone else.  I also feel like Instagram has a stronger marketable approach of word-of-mouth than blogging does.  If I like something, I take a picture of it and share it immediately, that's kind of become the standard with our technological generation.  There's even a hashtag if we post a picture later than when it happened.

  

The most important aspect that I really enjoy about Instagram and the reason that got me started is the opportunity to share my life moments.  I can share birthday parties, dinners with friends, baseball games on Thirsty Thursdays, cute dates, or moments with my dogs (which I do quite often).  The filters make it fun but we're with Instagram we're actually documenting our lives.  If you Instagram as often as I do, you document moments every single day and often times, more than one moment.  I can scroll through my Instagram profile and see pictures of every care package I sent Ryan while he was deployed and the shenanigans my freshman residents did while I was a House Fellow at Wisconsin.  It's a time capsule that shares my interests and events that are happening right now.

Our next step is to actually publish this, whether it's printing the photos or gathering them in a book.  We're documenting our generation for the future.

Do you use Instagram?  How do you think it has affected your life?   

Thanks for reading xoxo

Instagram 2012 Year in Review

Holy geez

What an awesome year!

I realized yesterday that putting my blog, year in review recap didn't even begin to address all of the stuff Ryan and I did this year or just events that happened.  Raechel Myers, blogger at Finding My Feet, made a year in review and it inspired me to put this together.  As a visual learner, it was fun to reminisce, from being in college to Holly's ears still not standing up yet and finally moving to California.

I hope we continue to have many more awesome adventures in the new year.

Peace N' Blessings y'all

Instagram for Blogging & New Blog Obsessions for December

Last night I went through my Google Reader feed and updated my blog following.

I followed probably over 200 blogs and many of them were outdated, not up kept, or if you read my content rant, did not really have what I was looking for from my blogging experience.

So I've been trying a new approach- Instagram. I've had my Instagram for over a year now and you can follow me at the Instagram handle- kimberlyersk1ne.  It's the same as my blogger account, in case you lose this post and are still interested in following.  I have a private account, but send a request and we can become Instagram buddies.  I love seeing updates of different lives through views of snapshots.  Instagram is quite possibly my most favorite outlet of social media. I'm really glad that they clarified their new policies, otherwise life would be a little weird without that lovely gem.

I've chosen to follow the Instagrams of blogs that I'm interested in or people that are just really cool.  I definitely have an Instagram "type." I know, it's like dating all over again.  I love hipster mommas and people sharing fun, little-known products or crafting/design projects.  For the season, I love snapshots of Wisconsin and Madison and anything Christmas-related.  With following bloggers via Instagram, I can identify which ones really fit my personality and wham bam, thank ya ma'am- I'm a new subscriber to their blog.  

The original problem was that I subscribed to way too many blogs and many of them really weren't my style.  I love finding new blogs, regardless of how many I've subscribed to, I just often have to do some clean-up work.  If you think I would lurve to follow a specific blog- send me yours or their Instagram feed handle.  I realized that I need to find more that fit that quality of content that I discussed in that earlier post so let the search begin!

Here are some of my new favorites:

Gridiron Lipstick- Kait Sawyer

Why Should You Follow Kait- She's so adorable and fun and I love her posts.  Essentially, she fits all of my blogging criteria lol.  While being in a long distance, military relationship, she has created so many cute crafts and has so many adventures.  She talks about having extraordinary events happen to her (or better yet, she goes out and makes those opportunities happen).  This East Coast lady loves margaritas and her adorable chocolate labbie (aka labrador retriever). As a dog lover myself- this is an A+ in my book.

Crunchy Catholic Momma

I am obsessed with this family and the momma blogger is just so darn cute! She crafts up a storm and encourages folks to actually use what they have in their craft baskets.  My husband alone loves that message since it's impossible for me to walk into any craft store without spending $20. Which by the way, walked into Michael's yesterday with my 50% iPhone app coupon and bought ribbon and stitch counters all for under $5. If that's not impressive from a crafting perspective, I don't know what is.  Back to the blog, I originally found it while searching for a tutorial on how to make a cost effective Waldorf doll.  This lady is so crafty and basically someone I completely admire for the influence she has on her children. They have an itty bitty farm and a ton of kids.  Overall she has great, quality blog posts and has made me re-think what it takes to raise a family.

The Freckled Fox

Emily herself is just too cute.  I adore her hair, and fittingly so, since she includes hair tutorials on her blog.  She's another blogger who loves paying attention to the details.  Her posts and pictures feature everything sparkly, wonderful and festive in her life, including her beautiful fambam.  She loves to sew, craft, thrift and basically do everything that I love to do (I'm seeing a trend here :P)  This Southern Idaho lady has three lovely babies and of course, anytime there's an adorable momma with cute little ones- ya know there are going to be amazing ideas that I'll have to save for my future babies ;) 

Poppytalk

So many cute ideas in one spot! I found this blog via Pinterest, aka the land of all that is good and wonderful. There are a bunch of crafting ideas, cute decor items and they also feature other blogs. Consider it blogging eye candy.

 

Baby Rabies

If you're looking for another adorable mommy blog, Baby Rabies  is pretty funny and of course, super cute.  She's the momma who created the #InappropriateElf contest and they're so funny!  Although the contest is over, I'm still working on shooting a rather hilarious Elf on the Shelf moment with my elf, Blisterz.

That's What She Read
As a book lover, if your Instagram or blog feed starts featuring the covers of novels, I'm already intrigued.  Of course, this blog title had me at "hello." Jen works for a non-profit hospital in the marketing department and is an avid reader.  She provides book reviews as well as information on an online bookclub for bloggers called, "The Literary Junkies Book Club."  This is organized by By the Porchlight and Goings on in Texas, two blogs which I've just started to follow and hopefully will be just as fabulous as they seem.  I've just requested to be apart of their bookclub, so hopefully I can do a future post on how awesome it is :)

 The Kinch Life
I think Aubrey's relationship with her husband is wonderful! She talks about her faith so openly and her posts have such great content.  I also love that she's a fan of tattoos and incorporates her beliefs into many aspects of her life.  She's also a big fan of Target and Harry Potter- a winning combination in my book. This is another blogger whose Instagram feed, I simply adore.

The Dainty Squid
Last but certainly not least, I love Kaylah's blue hair.  I love self-expression and if I wasn't in the Air Force, I'm pretty sure I would have tried out several more different hairstyles than the long, jet black hair that I have now.  Kaylah is another blogger who loves little details and I constantly swoon over her pictures.  I feel like if Anthropologie was a person, combined with Urban Outfitters and Etsy- that would be Kaylah.

There you have it, some of my favorite blogs that I've come across since my last post in November.

Now this is just a build-up of my current favorites.  To check out some of my recurring favesies, you can find the post here, which includes Southern Hospitality, Trial By Sapphire, The Chronicles of Ruthie Hart, Today, I'm Bobby, and The Daily Tay. Keep in mind that I don't have traditional blog sponsors, just new blogging friends who I love to support.  I try to keep my blog "clean" by not having too many guest posts or giveaways, but I do love to feature a great blogger so do not hesitate to visit the sponsor page and swap for free.  These featured blogs in this post are blogs that I legitimately like and I think many of my readers will be interested in as well. So curl up in front of the fire with your laptop and some great blogs to start reading!

xoxoxo,

Get More Out of Your Instagram Experience

Ever since I got my iPhone (about a year ago), I am obsessed with taking pictures.

Instagram is probably my favorite out of all social media outlets.

I love keeping in touch with my friends and their daily activities with little snapshots of their day.

It also introduces you to cute outfits, new items and product reviews

...and you might not even realize it.

 Here are some of my favorite apps, tips and tricks:

Phonto paired with Rhonna Designs

I made this using Phonto & Picfx

Phonto essentially allows you to add text to images, but not just that, you can download fonts from sites like dafont.com (for free!) and add them to your Phonto via your iTunes.  That way you can get fun fonts to add to your photos, even symbols if you would rather add cute images.  If you visit the Rhonna Designs blog, you'll be able to find a ton of fun ways to use images and fonts for your Instagram account.  I purchased a few different Insta packages and recently got the Christmas bundle.  I'm obsessed ;)

Picfx

 This is my go-to for photo editing but I recently discovered (as in a few hours ago) another app which I'll explain down below.  I really love the different effects you can have on various photos and you can upload them directly to Instagram.  My favorite feature has to be the lighting effects which includes 5+ Bokeh filters...ya know, the twinkling light effects :)

Pic Stitch

Just your basic collage maker.  There are a ton of em out there.

Bubble Frame

Not my favorite app but I do use it to create fun "bubble" frames for photos.  I kind of feel like it only has one function.  I would rather see a bubble frame included in Picfx.

Typic

 

Just got this app today and I'm really excited to use it.  It seems fairly similar to Phonto, although I'm not sure about the ability to download fonts.  Again, I don't know much about it but this seems to be a very basic "add text to pictures" app.

 

VSCO CAM

 

New effects toy! I'm excited to use the filters with this app because they make very subtle changes to pictures.  Picfx can drastly change your photos so I'm looking forward to doing some iPhone editing with this guy.

So these are some of my favorite iPhone photo apps.  If you have some favorites, definitely comment because I love experimenting with different apps.

xoxoxo