New things for the blog

Happy Wednesday! So tomorrow we embark on our road trip tomorrow, and I am not sure if I will be able to blog the rest of the week. But I wanted to let you know about some fun things I have planned to be starting here.

1. I started up Inspired Tuesday again yesterday. Be sure to check out that post for your free printable and to link up your awesome blog posts! I am also looking for co-hosts, so if you are interested be sure to let me know!

2. I know a lot of people use Wednesdays for a wordless Wednesday  Well here, Wednesdays are going to full of words. I have always wanted to write a book, but I never do it (well that is not true, I have written one, but it sits unedited.). Soooo instead each week I am going to post a new part to a new story that I have rolling around in my mind. I do not guarantee it will be interesting all the time, nor that the grammar will be up to snuff. I just plan to write and share and see where it goes. Oh and it is going to have dragons. So that is reason enough for you to come read right?

3. I want to start up a new link up 'Ask Me Anything'. I don't know what day to do it, so I am open to suggestions. Each week I will choose a reader questions and do my best to answer it. I hop that maybe some of you may want to join in the fun. Once I can I will post the question in advance so you all can also try to attempt to answer and link up. So I need your help. I need some questions to choose from for the first post! So leave me an Ask Me Anything question in the comments below if you can.

Alright, that is about it. I have to get packing for our trip!

Inspired Tuesday

So it is time to start up the Inspired Tuesday link up again! Here is this weeks free printable.

You can download it from HERE

Inspired Tuesday

Each Tuesday I host Inspired Tuesday where I offer up a free printable with some encouraging words.

I believe that any post written can inspired someone else, whether it is a personal story, a photography, a recipe.. whatever, so I invite everyone to link up their posts no matter the topic.

The rules are simple:

1) Follow me and if there is a co-host, them as well in any way of your choosing.

2) It would be nice if you added the Inspired Tuesday button to your post, or even just a link back to the link-up.

That's it.

Here is the button if you would like it:

<div align="center"><a href="http://notsouglyducklings.blogspot.com/" title="Not So Ugly Ducklings"><img src="http://i1250.photobucket.com/albums/hh540/sommerfugldesign/inspired-tuesday-button_zpsa22cc19f.png" width="150" alt="Inspired Tuesday" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

I am looking for a Co-Host or two. If you are interested leave me a comment below and I will get back to you as soon as I can.

Road Trip

On Thursday we are embarking on a road trip to London.. with 2 toddlers and a 4 month old... I think we are bit crazy to be honest.

In some ways I am dreading the drive. Normally, without stops it is about a 15 hour drive. We three small kids we breaking it down into two days. Manageable right? I hope so. I am praying that we don't encounter too much fighting. Julius likes to pester Elisabeth, which results in screaming. Elisabeth is also not too fond of her car seat... which results in screaming. If I have to listen to constant screaming I am going to go a bit nutty!

But we have a plan. Endless movies for the kids. Perhaps not the healthiest thing for them, but then again sitting in a car for 10 hours probably isn't healthy either. We of course will make stops along the way. I will have to feed Olivia after all, but we are hoping that they are just quick stops. I would rather get to the hotel quickly then drag the day out longer.

In other ways I am looking forward to it. It all goes to plan (it rarely does with 3 under 3) the kids will zone out on cartoons and we will have a somewhat relaxing day. I can crochet a bunch of things for the photogragphy business.. relax... maybe read a bit. I can dream right?

It's going to be a busy week. Thursday we are driving through Denmark and Germany. Friday we will hit The Netherlands, Belgium, France and then arrive in England by ferry. We are then in London until the 5th, then we drive home again.

It's been a while since we have gone on a trip. I am excited to see some new sights. I have never been to London, and I really don't remember the scenery from the last time we drove to France. So it will all be new for me. That is exciting.

One thing that is on my mind is what to do for snacks. Do any of you have any good ideas for road trip snacks that are toddler friendly?

Nearly Unpacked

So I finally got my pages in order, and my navigation bar. I have nearly finished unpacking the blog! I am excited. This blog has kind of just been floating around for the last year and I am happy to kind of have it set and tacked down a bit.

There are still a couple of odds and ends to fix up. Like getting my networks up in the footer.

But what do you think? I like it!

I have re-done a few things to go with the new design.

I re-did my advertising. I plan to blog more here again, so I want to offer up advertising. So there is a whole page devoted to that up in the navigation bar. Feel free to give that a little look.

I have also added a Blog Design page that links to the Sommerfugl Design and the Blogspot Design Learning Portal

I updated my About Me page with an awesome new picture of myself that I am in love with.

I added a Blog Hop page. This page will have info about any blog hops I host, as well as any that I join in. Speaking of blog hops, Inspired Tuesday is going to be back up and running this coming week and I am looking for some co-hosts. No silly costs to co-host, just some people to join in the fun. If you are interested leave me a comment on this post and I will get back to you.

Hmmmm am I forgetting anything? Probably. Well have a look around and let me know what you think of the new and improved Not So Ugly Ducklings.

Hanging out today with:

Battle of the bath

(I know I know... I still haven't got my navigation bar and pages up yet....)

I always look forward to bath time. I know, strange right? But seriously, it is one of my favorite times with the kids. You see, we have made bath time kind of special. It is our one on one time with the kids.

We don't just sit there and watch, we get right in there with them and enjoy the time together. It is where I get the most cuddles out of my toddlers. We lay back, at the beginning and relax for a few minutes. I often get hugs. I wash the kids hair, then we usually play until the water starts getting cold.

It is the one thing about our apartment I am going to miss the most. Our new house only has a shower. Anyways I am getting of course here...

If you have toddlers, then you will know that once one thing starts going smooth, they throw a curve and mess the whole system up.

This is Julius right now. He declared war on bath time. He decided he wants nothing to do with it. In general we thought it was gonna be a momentary thing and we didn't push. But after a few days and one stinky little toddler boy I dragged him kicking and screaming into the bathroom, stripped him down and got into the bath with him. He kicked. He punched. I some how managed without and bruises. He screamed bloody murder (what our neighbors must think...). It was such an event, and he was already tired and cranky, he promptly fell asleep in my arms. All that fighting wore him out. Huge bath failure.. I couldn't even wash his hair.

The next time, same scenario but without the tired boy. There were bruises that time. And I was at a loss for what to do. Our special time was no longer special.

Wanna know what the answer is? The white flag to the battle of the bath? LEGO.

Picture from Flickr. Click for Original source.

All little kids (well most I assume) love LEGO. So I grabbed a bucket full, headed to the bathroom and started filling the tub with water.

I did not ask my son to join me. I just made sure that he saw me take the LEGO.

Within minutes curiosity got the best of him and he made his way to the bathroom to see what I was doing with his beloved toys.

As soon as he got in there I dumped the bucket of LEGO into the tub. Julius was thrilled and started to take off his clothes, excited to play with his LEGO in the bath.

We have not had a battle of the bath since. Thank goodness for that!

One a completely different note.. want the free valentines printable that you see below? Head over to Sommerfugl Design today to download it.

Still need to unpack

So I have moved the blog. Yay! However I still need to unpack. This means my pages are blank, my navigation bar isn't working like it is supposed to, and some of my buttons in my sidebar are down. BUT I have GFC now ;) Feel free to follow that way.

Until I get more settled here, here is a pretty picture from the weekend:

Linking up with:

Moving

We are moving in about a month. We have yet to start packing, and probably won't until after our trip to London the first week of February  I am excited to be moving to a new place. More excited that it is a house with a yard for the kids to play in, with apple trees (free fruit!). The house is also being renovated a bit with a new kitchen, some new floors and fresh paint. I can not wait to see what it looks like once it is finished.

There is a big part of me that wishes we could afford to ditch our old second hand furniture and buy some new stuff. For example I would love a reclining leather chairs from gowfb. Or a big comfy couch like this:

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="333"] Image from Pinterest. Click to see Pin.[/caption]

Some day we will get new furniture. Once we get caught up on other things I think. We have discussed that our plan is to do one room at a time completely. But I think that some day will more likely be will be when we actually buy a house. That could be a long way off, so I guess until then I will have to settle for dreaming in Pinterest.

Still moving day is soon! I can't wait for it. And even more exciting is being able to get started on my studio as well. So much work and fun in the very near future!

I also have some more moving news. Not only am I moving in real life, this blog is also moving. Over the next week or so I am shifting the blog back to a blogspot blog:

The new address will be http://notsouglyducklings.blogspot.dk/ and I am having my good online friend Sarah Halstead design it for me to help her get to Blissdom and she is doing an awesome job! I think I may have helped create a pretty strong competitor in the blog design department. But seriously, if you are looking for a quick re-design she is doing some design work to help pay for her trip to Blissdom (so jealous!) and you should check her out.

Okay, enough about Sarah and back to me. So why am I moving to blogspot? Well, I have decide to change my photography business name from Sommerfugl Photography to Desirae Rasmussen Photography. It is just easier and better for business. This means I need to free up my enitre desiraer.com domain for photography instead of purchasing yet another domain (I am up to 3 right now!).  So that is why I am moving. If you follow by RSS, I don't think you will loose your subscription, as I will just move that over. If you follow me in other ways, you should be fine as well. And there will be a new way to follow... GFC.  I am hoping to make the switch next week, and my next post will probably be there. So see you at the new Not So Ugly Ducklings :)

Test

Testing

Happy 2013!

So it has been a while. A long while since I posted. Well, I have just been busy.  Like busy in all directions. Here is what has mostly kept me from posting here lately:



I switched over my Blogger eCourse to a Blogspot Design Learning Portal. For $30 you gain unlimited access to the website, which has all the tutorials and downloads from the eCourse, access to forums to ask me questions and get help on your blog design, as well as the opportunity to network with the other bloggers signed up. So if you have been wanting to learn to design your own Blogspot blog, you should check this out! I promise the tutorials are super easy to follow, and afterwards you will never need a blog designer again.

I have also been busy shooting people:









The photography business seems to be taking off. Right now we are working on getting my studio up and going. It has been fun and exciting.

So that is what has been taking up most of my time.

How has your 2013 started?