Instagratitude Project

Wow, November is already here and going strong.  With the craziness of Halloween and then Denali's birthday party the very next day, I didn't get a chance to share about the Instagratitude Project yet.  For the last 2 years (2013 and 2012), during the month of November, I've shared daily on Instagram something I was grateful for.  And even though I'm a couple days late this year, I'm excited for #instagratitude2014.  

As the Holiday's approach, I want to be sure the focus of my mind and heart is on the many blessings I have in my life.  I'm choosing to be grateful.  It's easy to get bogged down in the hectic pace of life and fret the things I don't have.  So, I need this daily exercise to remind myself of what is good and important in my life.

As a Christian, I want to honor God by sharing how grateful I am for his provision and generosity in my life.  I live such a blessed life.  I have the best husband, awesome kids, a beautiful home, amazing opportunities and my life is full of family and friends that love, encourage and support me. How can I not share all that I am grateful for.  

I hope you'll join me.  If you want to participate and be encouraged and inspired, capture one image a day on instagram that represents something you are grateful for, then add the hashtag #instagratitude2014. Invite your friends to join in. 

These verses are great reminders for me:

Psalm 9:1
I will give thanks to you, Lord, with all my heart; I will tell of all your wonderful deeds.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 
Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. 

Psalm 107:1
Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever.  

To see how this works, I'm @oleanderandpalm on instagram.

Exploring the Redwoods

Yesterday was my sweet mom's birthday! We celebrating by taking a little day trip to some new and some favorite spots in the Redwoods. I really do love California. I've shared before that I was born Canadian, but actually grew up in Papua New Guinea. So, California is where I chose to live 14 years ago. This state really has so much to offer and I love to share my favorite Cali spots with my readers.

So, we did a very touristy thing, that my kids have been wanting to do ever since my parents moved to Eureka, CA 4 years ago, we rode the Sky Trail in the Trees of Mystery. It's about a one hour drive North of Eureka and just a few minutes drive South of Cresent City. The little hike up to the Sky Trail takes you through a very dated, quirky walk through some beautiful Redwoods. In the 60's the Trees of Mystery attraction was put in and there really hasn't been much of an update. There is funny dramatic music that accompanies the guided self guided tour featuring the tale of Paul Bunyan. And we really enjoyed the whole retro package. The ride on the Sky Trail gave us a tree top view of the Redwoods. I really do recommend trying out this attraction if you are in the area.

We also hiked through Fern Canyon. It's an amazingly lush steep canyon. The walls of the canyon are covered in beautiful, green ferns. It's a fun little hike over log bridges and in and out of the little river up the canyon. It's definitely a must see in Northern Cal.

And I love my new app, Over. I added this great text and artwork to my instagrams using this app. If you follow me, I'm sure you'll be seeing a lot more of it very soon. And the app even uses fun illustrations and text from one of my favorite bloggers, Megan Gilger of The Fresh Exchange.

DIY Instagram Hexagon Frame

I know I talk a lot about instagram. But because I'm such a huge fan, I've got a lot of instagrams that need to be shared. Sometimes I just get frustrated that all my favorite images are just floating in cyber space. I just don't print images as much as a should anymore. So, I've come up with a fun way to display some of my favorites in my home.

I still have a lot of affection for triangles, but hexagons seem to be the next new hip geometric shape. And really triangles are not a great shape for instagrams, hexagons are a lot more in proportion. Using a 12x12" piece of scrapbooking card stock and made this custom mat board to frame 11 of my faves.

To start, I picked out some instagrams that I loved and resized them to 2 1/2" squares and then printed them at Walgreens. Or if you prefer to print at home, follow these instructions to size and print your instagrams. 

Then I cut my hexagon mat board using my Cricut machine. In Cricut Craft Room, I created my template using simple hexagons that were just over 2 inches wide. You can play around with the placement of your shapes, I just wanted a random arrangement of hexagons.  Then I simply cut my 12" piece of card stock. If you aren't lucky enough to own a Cricut, then this could be easily done with an x-acto knife and a hexagon template.  But, my Cricut sure made this easy and and the results are very professional looking. 

Next, I took one of the cut out hexagons and used it to cut out my images. I simply held it over the part of the image I wanted to show and then cut around the shape, leaving a 1/4" edge around. This will give you space to attach the image to the back of the mat. I just used a little tape to adhere the pictures to the mat, so that they would stay in place. 

Then I framed it in a 12" shadow box frame that I got at Target for $9.99 (this one is very similar). I think I'll have fun changing out these pictures in a year or so. Or maybe I'll just make another one. 

Do you print your instagrams? Or are they forever stuck on your smart phone? Mine are slowly coming off my phone and into my home so that we can all enjoy them. Happy instagraming friends!

I've also submitted this design to Minted.  If you like it, please take a second to vote for it.

art prints - Hexagon Collage

Instagram iphone Case Giveaway

This giveaway is sponsored by INK361, but my words and opinions are all my own.

I've got a fun giveaway for you. I have two totally customizable iphone cases to giveaway. INK361 allows you easily take your favorite instagram images and turn them into fabulous iphone cases.

I turned one of my favorite instagrams of Olivia into this iphone case. I took this picture one evening outside one of our favorite Mexican restaurants while we waited for a table. That's the beauty of instagram, you may not always have your camera with you, but you probably will have your phone. And then you can slap on a fun filter and share your shot with the world.

You know I'm a huge instagram fan. I'm on it all the time, posting pics and checking out what everyone else is up to. But some of my favorite shots of my kids and adventures are just stuck in the virtual world of instagram. It's nice to be able to bring them to life in print.  INK361 offers professional photo prints, elegant fine art prints,  photo cards, mosaics, canvas prints and iphone cases.

For a long time I've used the INK361 widget to display my images in the sidebar of my blog. They offer a great instagram web viewer where you can like, comment, share and organize your instagrams.

So here's how you can enter to win one of 2 iphone cases from INK631. Simply follow me (@jeranmcconnel) on instagram and then leave me a comment below with your instagram handle so I can check your instagrams out as well.  For additional entries, just share this giveaway on twitter, facebook, pinterest or instagram and then leave me a comment telling me how you shared. This giveaway will be open till Sunday, July 7th noon.  I will announce the winner on Monday, July 8th.  Two lucky readers will get to head over to INK361 and make their own instagram iphone case.

This Week

This week... well it was a doozy.  The weekend was fabulous with lots of celebrations. We celebrated my baby brother's 25th birthday (who also finished painting my garage), Lonnie's birthday, Mother's day and a I hosted fun baby shower.  Then came Monday morning - I got rear ended at a red light!  Boo, Mondays do stink.  But, I've pushed through this week and actually ended it on a pretty productive note.  I'm refinishing a small dresser for Lonnie's bedside table and I'm also repainting Olivia little play kitchen.  I hope you all have a great weekend.  I'm looking forward to getting a lot accomplished.

Olivia // My freshly painted garage

Honeyed Apricot Marshmallows // Lonnie with his birthday cinnamon rolls

Thrifting Thursday Finds // A last minute baby shower gift

Me enjoying a post-baby shower iced coffee // A sneak peek at the thrift store dresser I'm refinishing

If you follow my instagram, these pictures may look familiar to you.  But here's a little instagram taste of my week.

Window Shopping - Coral Accents

I've been loving coral colored flowers this week, if you follow my instagram, you may have noticed.  And seeing this color with all the grey and green in our home, I'm total digging it.  It's my new favorite color combo coral, grey and green.  It would sure make a pretty party palette as well. 

Ombre Pillow // Giraffe // Coffee Table

World Map // Bird Print

Rectangle Print // Paper Flowers // Bowl

So, I thought I'd do a little online window shopping at my favorite stores and pick out some fun coral accents that would look good in my living room.  Now that I have a new chair, I'm really wanting to modernize and update our living room.  I'm thinking a few splashes of coral might be nice, what do you think?   Is there anything in this round up that catches your eye? 

This Week

This week..... well, this is really a sampling of the last 2 weeks via my instagram.

I don't often share a lot of my personal life here on O + P, but we've had a tough week and a half.  Well, mostly Denali has.  If you don't know my daughter, she is the quietest, sweetest, kindest little girl.  Denali is in 6th grade, and this year she started middle school.  Anyways, to make a very long story short, she caught some girls in her class doing something they shouldn't and so she reported it to the teacher.  As a result, these girls threatened Denali in a very serious way (I am being vague for a reason).  But, it didn't end there.  Even after suspensions, these girls came back even more aggravated and the threats and bullying continued.  And as of yesterday, these girl's friends are now picking on my baby.  We are hoping this will end, but if it doesn't end NOW we ready to make some big changes.  The whole process has not only been worrisome for Denali, but it's also involved many painful trips and phone calls to the principal's office.  

On the bright side, my parents were here last week for a few days.  We got to celebrate my Dad's birthday together.  And my sister in law came from San Diego with my very cute niece and nephew. That's his sweet little hands making donuts with my mom. 

We also went to LA on Saturday.  It was nice to get out of town.  We hit IKEA and then went to West Elm LA and Emily Henderson was there with a Pop-Up Etsy shop. It was fun to meet her again (I met her previously at Alt).  My kids loved the fancy drinks and treats and we played in the photo booth.  And I might have ordered a new chair for our living room (eeeeek!).  Then we headed over to The Grove and got some dinner at the farmer's market.  

this week

This week...... Well, it was definitely been a full one.  Here's a few of my instagrams from the week.  This week was jam packed with activities and a whole lot of LOVE. Somewhere in the middle of the week's craziness, I began questioning my sanity.  But, I made it through. 

I made a lot of heart shaped meals and treats and had a little Valentine's party with close friends.  We had lots of cousin love and Olivia couldn't be happier.  She can't get enough of her cousins, well no of us can. They are the sweetest.  And I was a super lucky girl and got showered with lovely Valentine's Day gifts from my hubby and had a wonderful night out with him last night.  

I hope you all had a great week and that you felt loved.  I've been getting Riley ready today, we're going camping tomorrow!  I can't wait.  We need some peace and quite that only time outdoors can bring.  With Lonnie working so much, our family needs a good old camping trip.  I'll take pictures and share our adventures with you next week.

Enjoy your weekend with the ones you love.

Instagratitude 2012 Recap

I'm so pleased with the Instagratitude Project.  Thanks so much to everyone who participated.  Do you know that 276 photos were shared on instagram with the #intsagratitude2012 hashtag?  I am so excited with how many times people shared their gratitude this month.  It was really inspiring and uplifting for me to share and see what everyone else was sharing.  It definitely put me in a better frame of mind each day.

Here's my Instagratitude picutres.  If you participated, I'd love to know what you thought, and how this affected you this month.  I'm already looking forward to Instagratitude 2013!

Instagratitude Project

November, really?  This is that super busy time of year where there just isn't enough minutes in the day.  I do need to slow down long enough to consider all that I am thankful for.  So, I'm starting a challenge for myself. I'm going to share one thing everyday of November that I'm thankful for.  But, it will have a fun twist. I'm sharing it through instagram!  I'd love it if you would join in.  Everyday, capture an image that represents something you are grateful for.  It can be big or small blessings in your life.  My hope is that I can focus my mind and heart on what I DO have, not what I DON'T.  I want an attitude of gratitude.

Here's how it will work.  Post your image on Instagram, but add the tag #instagratitude2012 and if you want, you can tag me @jeranmcconnel as well.

I'm sure that all my East Coast friends are struggling to be thankful.  With all the damage and lives lost, my heart hurts for you.  You are in my prayers.  Sometimes is so hard to see God and any good when you are in the middle of life's storms (literally).  I am definitely not preaching, but I hope that this is helpful to you. This verse is such a good reminder to me.  Sometimes I have to say it to myself over and over again.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 
Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.  

I hope you'll participate in my Instagratitude Project, please leave a comment with your instagram username so that I can follow you also.  I'm excited for the good things to come. 

Instagram Necklace

This is fun DIY folks.  Are you digging instagram like I am these days?  I'm having so much fun playing with filters and sharing my stylish pictures instantly with my friends.  I'm such a visual person, so thumbing through all my instagram friends images is quite addictive.  I love how nothing really needs to be said or explained.  It's fascination having a peak into someones else instant life.  I'm amused and entertained by what people share on instagram.  It's quite revealing.

Sometimes I think my instagram pictures are some of the best pictures I take.  I think a lot of it has to do with the unplanned nature of taking a picture with your phone.  It can be whipped out in a seconds notice and then that spontaneous moment in time is captured.

I decided it would be fun to have a modern twist on the traditional locket.  So, here's my Instagram Necklace. This is a two sided locket that fits 1 1/4" square images, perfect for instagrams.  For now, mine has 2 images from the 4th of July.  We were in Carlsbad, NM for the 4th.  The first is my beautiful kids and the second is some fireworks.  The beauty of this necklace is that you can trade out the pictures whenever you want.

Supplies:
1 Beading Landing (Bezels, Frames, and Filigree) Square Pendant  - available at Michaels
1 42" length of metal chain (Blue Moon Beads, Oval chain in Burn Silver) - available at Joannes
Needle nose pliers
Scissors
Two 1 1/4" square images (Instagrams!)
Oh, and I added the cute little camera charm - available at Target for $4.99

I'm sorry you are going to have to actually go to the store for these items.  I looked all over the internet and couldn't find either the square pendant or chain.  Sorry friends I tried. Oh, but these items where very inexpensive. I got the pendant for $2.40 and the chain for $2.40 (both bought with 40% off coupons).

Here's what you do:
1.   From a mac, in iphoto, select the instagram image you would like to print.  In the print window, go  to Print Size and select custom. Then enter 1.25 " by 1.25".
2.   Print the image on photo paper.
3.   Cut out your 2 images.
4.   Place them back to back in the pendant.
5.   Measure the length you would like your necklace to be.  Mine is about 36".
6.   Remove one link from the chain and slip it onto the top of the pendant  (leave the link open).
7.   Then attach that open link to one end of the chain and using the pliers pinch it closed.
8.   And finally, close the necklace by attaching the lose end of the chain to the link you just attached.

I've been wearing mine a lot this week.  Does this look like a project you might attempt?

Oh, and if you are not already following, my instagram name is jeranmcconnel.  And if you like what you see, BE A FRIEND!  Leave a comment, follow Oleander and Palm by email, Pinterest, Facebook, or Twitter.

My weekend in Instagrams

I'm trying something new.  Here's a look at my weekend in Instagrams.  It was a busy one.  I'm having a lot of fun playing with this app.  Let me know if you like this kind of post. 

Made a yummy carrot cake with cream cheese frosting for a dessert auction at our church.  The money raised is going to send a team to Haiti.

Plants some succulents on my front porch.

 My nephew was here for the weekend.  Enjoyed some cuz time.

 Papa was also here, Olivia and him got a little nap together.

 Had fun at the park.

Olivia had fun with her Uncle Josh.  Yes, he is my brother, no we aren't twin, but yes we look a lot alike.

Wore Pre-Preggo jeans this weekend.  Definitely gave myself a fist pump and maybe even a high five.

Finished my dad's birthday quilt.

And Lonnie crashed on his mountain bike and has a serious case of road rash.  The poor guy had a miserable weekend and was in a lot of pain.  This is the pretty view, it's much worse under the shirt.  I hope you appreciate that I made this pic black and white.