Bring on Summer 2013

It's been awhile and lots has happened since St. Patty's Day.  (most definitely)

First off, I did a drastic change to the hair that several of my family members were shocked by.  Check out the first photo below with my monkey girl.  I made it REALLY red!!!  The second photo is now what is happening to my hair since the radiant red only stayed in the hair for 2-3 weeks and now I have a red hair with blonde highlights.  I will be heading back to the hair dresser next week to get my radiant red back again since I LOVED it and I loved the reaction I got from people.  I had several people asking me how did I keep that color for so long and that I looked amazing with it.  

On to upcoming news.  I am a year and half away from getting my Bachelor's in Computer Networks and Security.  My hubby is even kind of jealous that I will be getting my degree before he does.  I'm VERY determined.  

We are moving in less than 2 months...well...at least I am moving less than 2 months.  I have to move down to Pensacola earlier than expected since I have to make sure to be set up before my second set of summer classes start in June.  I will be finishing my first two classes and starting two other classes at the same time.  I will be stressed to the max from June 24th to July 7th...but that is okay.  I am that closer to receiving my degree.  Hubs even said, he wants me to actually go for the graduation and not just get the piece of paper.  He wants to see me in my cap and gown receiving my degree in Maryland.  =)  

My oldest daughter, Alexia is going to be come a beach bum once we move down to Florida.  Her cousins have already decided they will be grabbing her up whenever they go to the beach...so be prepared to see pictures of my oldest daughter after summer is over and I'll take a picture of her and her Daddy...and you will see my daughter tans darker than my husband does and he is half Caucasian and half African American.  

June is going to be one hectic month for my family and I.  

The beginning of the month is Alexia's dance recital, which includes Leotard rehearsal, Dress Rehearsal...and of course Recital.  This Mama is stressed to the max since Alexia has her hip hop routine for #4 during Act I and her ballet routine for #9 during Act I.  I will be backstage changing that girl from hip hop gear (which includes a blue/green wig) to her ballet gear (which her hair has to be up at the top with a blue bow and poofy hair).  In the end though, seeing my oldest daughter on stage dancing in front of hundreds of people is PRICELESS.  

By mid-month of June, Alexia will be finishing 2nd grade and that is when the week of hell will happen...since that week I'll be packing up for the Pathfinder and trucking it to Pensacola, which hubby stays behind to take care of house stuff that needs to be done with the help of family and friends.  

That's the goal at least...we'll see how it goes when it eventually gets here.  We are ALL excited to move to the Sunshine State.  

Disney Trips in the near future...plus in October, Alexia's first concert to see one of her favorite singers, Selena Gomez thanks to her Mommy already purchasing tickets for it.  It will be a Mommy/Daughter event.  =)  

This year is definitely a GREAT year for us.  

We ready for the new adventures ahead for us...and I am definitely ready to be settled back in my home state. 

Now...I need to get back to reading since I have so many reviews to do in the next month.

Hope everyone is having a TERRIFIC week. =)  

Oh just for fun...I'm playing my ALL-time FAVORITE band's newest video:  

I love these GUYS!!!

Happy St. Patrick's Day

I am definitely proud to be half Irish.  =)  St. Patrick's Day is one of my FAVE Holidays since it is the holiday that I can make homemade Shepherd's Pie and bake green cookies...(yes green chocolate chip cookies...yum)  

This is the day that makes me want to visit or even move to Ireland so badly.  In the next 5 years I'll be in Ireland...that is my goal and I'm sticking with it.  My hubby who lived in Ireland briefly when he was much younger has told me how Ireland is and I definitely see myself never wanting to come back to the states if I do visit Ireland.

Here are some old photos of Alexia back in 2009 in honor of St. Patrick's Day...they definitely are some of my FAVE's of my oldest daughter.  Looking at these, reminds me I need to take even more photos of her since she is growing like crazy lately.  I also need to take some photos of my youngest in her Green clothes.  

I love my two Irish girls.  =)  

Hope everyone has an amazing St. Patrick's Day and does not get too drunk on green beer.  =)  

In honor of St. Patrick's Day...I'm sharing one of my fave songs from one of my FAVE Irish bands.  I remember listening to them constantly as a child.  =)

Meet "Toothless"

Alexia, our oldest daughter has been nicknamed "Toothless" until her big teeth pop through.  

She lost 3 teeth total in the last week and she lost two of them in school during PE.

The first thing she was worried about when she lost her first top tooth was school pictures on Friday.  

*sigh*  You can tell she loves getting her photograph taken.

We had to reassure her that almost half the class will most likely be missing their teeth as well.

Mommy then proceeded to show her own 2nd grade photo where I had she had two top missing and then Alexia had no reason to worry.  

We have a BEAUTIFUL "Toothless" girl in our household right now.

What is weird is that Alexia is losing teeth, while the youngest Devine is gaining teeth.

The poor tooth fairy was broke this past week.  I hope she gets a break before Alexia loses another tooth.  

Much Love,

FranJessca

My ring tone at the moment and one of my FAVE songs from M83:

A little late....but had to share

I have been meaning to share some of the photos from Devine's first birthday back in November.   

I finally got around to downloading the rest of the photos off of my Nikon D700.  I downloaded the ones off my Canon...but not my Nikon.  Oops!  Bad Mommy!  LOL

Here are some from my Nikon that I could not help but share.  

We have such a little "ham" living with us.  She demolished her birthday cake just like her older sister did on her 1st birthday.

I love the last two photos below because she is sticking her tongue out.  She loved getting ALL messy.  

No editing was done on the photos...just came out of the camera.  I only added my Loved For a Lifetime Photography mark.  =)  

We love our little "Monkey Girl"!   

Much Love,

FranJessca

Celine Dion....my ALL time favorite female singer and I just wanted to share one of my FAVE songs from her:

The world from a toddler

I thought I would share a couple of photos I took of Devine last month. Devine loves to get her photo taken, but there are days she rather explore and these photos are always my favorite.
I love taking photos of my girls.  I always told myself, I would capture every minute I can get with my girls so I can show them later on and show my grandchildren how their mothers were.  Believe me....I have taken over a lot of photos of my first daughter and now my second daughter is getting the same treatment.  Between the both of them, they will have a lot of photos to share with their children.

I love taking photos of Devine's eyelashes.  She has some VERY long eyelashes since the day she was born and I have been infatuated with them.  I love taking photos like the one above to capture them.  

There's some photos I do no retouch at all and this one above is straight out of my D700.  No effects or editing at all.  This is the main reason why I love Nikon over other cameras.  If the settings in the camera are the way I like and the lighting is perfect...I choose these photos over any edited photo out there.
This was taken before Valentine's Day.  She did not want anything to do with the heart and she kept trying to hand it off.  She wanted to explore instead.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

I promise to share more later on and next time I will share some of Alexia. 

Alexia has always been my natural model in front of the camera.

In fact, I'm overdue to take her portraits since she is now missing two teeth and a third is about to fall out.  She has been nicknamed "Toothless" because of her missing teeth.

The first thing she did after she lost her two teeth was get upset about her spring portraits.  I had to reassure her that every child will have a picture day where they are missing teeth.  It's childhood and it's pictures like those...that make this Mama realize how fast my little girl is growing up.  

Much Love,

FranJessca

One song that is on my iPhone and I play constantly:

Changes every Month

Ever since September, I have done something different to my hair thanks to my amazing hairdresser.  

She definitely has gotten me to where I finally wanted to be.  It took several months to get there and now I'm ready to do something else.  I have been out of the Navy for almost 2 years and the one thing that I have been wanting to do before I joined the Navy was to put blue, purple, or green in my hair.  

Well...my amazing hair dresser gave me a hair tip.  Due to the dye of the blue, purple or green...it fades after awhile.  It would not be worth it every month to put in my hair or even every two weeks.  She told me of a trick.  =)

I also even chatted with a Author while I was in FL last month that used to dye her hair almost every single month....and then she introduced me to hair extensions that are REAL human hair that blend in to your hair.  All you do is clip them in place.  

Here's  a pic of me in September with my girls with my dark red hair that I went with first.

Everyone loved it...but me...I wanted to do something else.  I saw a pic of my Mom when she was 17 years old with her natural strawberry blonde hair and I told my hair dresser that is what I wanted to go with next...

She was up for the challenge.

(photo courtesy of Amy Jenkins Photography)

(Below) Taken with my Iphone...this was my January hair color.  We were slowly getting there.

My hair dresser dyed my hair a lighter red and put blonde highlights in it.  

Now if you are wondering what my natural high color is...I have actually forgotten what it is.  LOL  Until I saw a school picture of me when I was 7.  Look at the photo above of Alexia and that was my natural hair color as a kid.  My hair slowly became auburn when I was a teenager.  I guess my Irish roots were taking over.  

Below is from last month.  This is the color I was going for....and I LOVE it!!

I have some many compliments over it and my friends were in shock after not seeing me for awhile and asked if I went lighter with my hair.  =) I actually looked WAY different in person.

Although, I wanted something else...and I took my hair dresser's and the author I met advice.

(Below) Now here's the look I have been DYING to have since I was a teenager and without the harsh dye.

I can place these hair extensions wherever I want to get a different look every time.

I even purchased pink and I'll be back to purchase more blue....and purchase purple and green next time as well.

What's up next for this month though...it's a new month which means I get to see my hairdresser.  I'm thinking about putting a different color highlight in my hair...but I will see once I get to the salon.

I am definitely going to miss my hair dresser when I leave for Florida in June.  I will have to find another person up to my hair challenges.

Hubby wants me to grow my hair out...but for now...it's all about getting the hair color where I want it. I have always preferred shorter hair to longer hair.  Maybe that will change later on...but for now while my youngest is little and is always pulling hair...I'll keep it short.

While everyone was else was going darker red during the winter months...I was going lighter.

My Mom always taught me to not follow in everyone else's footsteps and that is exactly what I was doing this winter.

Are you ready for a new pic of me this month...well...be prepared.  I'm taking it to another level.  

Much Love,

FranJessca

Here's a video my littlest one goes crazy about whenever she hears it and they have become a FAVE band of mine:

New Year....means new changes COMING soon!!!

I meant to start blogging here more, but my other blog has precedence over this one.  It has become HUGE over the last year.  My blog partner Anna and I just celebrated our first year at Book Lovin' Mamas and our Anniversary was a HUGE success.

If you haven't checked it out...just click on the image below to head on over there and give it a follow.  You definitely do not want to miss out on opportunities on amazing giveaways, reading interviews/guest posts from your favorite authors, or maybe even chatting with them in comments.  You can even read our reviews on the books we have read.  Most of them are Advanced Reading Copies now that we receive from authors/publishers.

This blog has taken over my life and I LOVE every minute of it.  I gave up my photography for awhile since I'm taking online college classes at UMUC right now and read a lot thanks to my stacks of books I need to read on my desk, bedroom, and Kindle.  I am actually booked for review books until mid-June.  How friggin' AWESOME is that.  I may not get paid to do this...but this is one HARD job to do.  I have a family I take care of, college assignments I have to do, running errands, and now reading 3 books at once or more to make sure I keep ahead on schedule with the blog a day.  It's AWESOME!!  I would not give it up for anything. Oh...and last month I went to my first book convention and had a blast.  I met some amazing bloggers and got to hang out and talk with some of my FAVE authors.  Seriously...it was the BEST time of my life and I look forward to going to another convention this year and attending the Olde City, New Blood one again when it comes back again.  I posted pics of the convention on Book Lovin' Mamas...so definitely check those out. To top off the BEST News...my family and I are making the jump to finally move to Florida permanently.  It's about damn time, right?  It took my husband getting news about his current job and everything else that has been going on to make our mind up.  Nothing is really holding me up here in Virginia anymore...except my amazing friends I made here.  I am going to miss every one of them.  It's time to make the leap though and embrace what life has to offer and with me getting my degree in Computer Networks & Security...we have a better opportunity on living an amazing life in Florida.   Did I tell everyone yet, that I haven't really even been looking for a job yet and since I got out of the Navy in 2011, I have been offered several.  I have had to turn them down until after I complete my Bachelor's degree.  Oh...and more good news...I am currently a JUNIOR in college...yes...I Junior...with the credits I have and brought in.  I only just started last year in January...which is even a BIGGER success for me.  You are probably wondering how that happened...how can I person who just started last year, be already a junior.   With taking 12 credits a semester...I one determined college student to on getting my degree faster...plus the Navy schools I went to and the on job training helped as well on getting credits as well.  College was one of the main reasons why I joined the Navy...next to traveling as well.  =) I'll have my degree by the end of 2014 with my Minor as well in English.   And that won't stop there...once I start job searching again in 2015 for a computer field job..I'll start working on my Master's Degree thanks to Voc Rehab possibilities.  My life has been truly amazing.  Last year had it's hiccups...but I made it through them with my new approach in life.  Always thinking positive and always setting goals at a reach I know I can do.  I have always been a goal setter since I was a little girl...you can ask my Mom and now my husband even noticed how when I set goals...they always come true.  It may take awhile, but it always happens, when their meant to.   This year has also brought in a new approach in religion for me.  I have accepted the fact, I am not Catholic or Christian really.   I have been looking into Buddhism for some time now and with the help of research, I have determined I have more in common and understanding with Buddhism.  I am hoping to reach more into it this year.   2013 definitely has been a GREAT year so far and I am looking forward to what it has to offer even more.   I'm embracing everything POSITIVE in my life...letting go over anything NEGATIVE.   I am even letting go over the past finally.  The past does not control me.  I am embracing the present and looking forward to the future. Thanks to my amazing husband, Phillip, for being there for me and being such an amazing best friend, I love you HONEY very much!!!   Thanks to my beautiful girls who keep me smiling and laughing...those two girls definitely have a way of making LIFE so magical.   New YEAR and NEW changes ahead...and I'm ready for them ALL!!! I promise to blog here more often...I may even share my journey into Buddhism, share my further adventures with Book Lovin' Mamas and maybe even dive back in Photography, but for now I think it's best to dive back into my stock photography...because I miss it.   Much Love from Me, FranJessca

And just for everyone's enjoyment...one of my FAVE songs/videos: