Day 05 - Textures

I am so excited, today was texture day. It is really amazing how adding texture to a photo can change the whole feel. In fact, photographing texture has become a recent obsession with me, even my 10 year old daughter points out textures and suggests that I take a photograph of it; you just never know when you will be able to use it. What I have done is added a folder to my ACDsee program and I have all my textures organized under that folder, so if I ever need texture I can easily find it.

Day 04 - Clipping Masks

Wow, this is so easy! Actually, I think it would be alot of fun to make my own grungy clipping masks. With the clipping mask you open a new document, your photo and clipping mask. Then by sizing your photo to the desired size, overlay the clipping mask so that the edge of your photo is overlapping the mask. Your photo will now take on the shape of your mask when you hover between the two layers and merge them to become one. You can also move your photo layer around to achieve the effect/placement you want. Ta-da! Don't you love the grungy edges?

Day 03 - Colors and Tints

I just love what we learned on Day 03's lesson, colors and tints. Jessica showed us that by using the hue/saturation function that you can adjust the colors of your photo and add sepia tones to grunge it up a bit. As soon as I completed this lesson I sent this photo over to Costco for printing. In fact, I already have this photo framed and hanging on my living room wall. What do you think?

Day 02 - Brushes

Catching up, no way. For some reason I keep getting sidetracked. Here it is again, what should be Day 04, yet I'm on Day 02. I'm hoping to make a little headway tomorrow. The good thing is that Jessica Sprague's class is self-paced, that's right self-paced. At least I can work at my own pace without falling behind. All of the information will always be available, guaranteed how cool is that! Today's lesson was Brushes, I just love brushes. Brushes can be used in so many ways and hey why not start a collection of brushes, the choices are limitless. Brushes can be colored to match your project, resized, erased, rotated, if you can think of it you can do it with brushes. Here is my overdue homework for Day 02.

Back to School - Day 1

Ok, I'm just a little tardy. Too much on my plate but I found some time this afternoon to listen and complete Lesson One of Photo Editing: Good to Great, from Jessica Sprague. Lesson 1 encompassed Exposure, Brightness and Contrast. Now, I have played around with these settings but I now understand what they can do. Here are a couple of photos that needed adjustments, otherwise they were pretty much "trash." What do you think? Thanks Jessica for saving my photos.

Photo Editing "Free" Class

How cool is Jessica Sprague? Jessica is so awesome, in order to celebrate her website's 2nd birthday she is offering a free class. Just hop on over to her site and click on the Got a Gift Code, yep it is as simple as that. Counting the days to July 6th, thanks, Jessica!

http://www.jessicasprague.com

I'm Published . . . 2009 Passporter

When I arrived home on day last week there was a package waiting for me, hum . . . I didn't recall expecting an order, what was it? It was address to me, yeah! I opened the package and there it was, the 2009 Passporter (A Guide to Walt Disney World), ooops I almost forgot I didn't order this but it was "payment" for the use of a picture I took at Saratoga Springs Resort of Ryleigh crossing the long foot bridge and she was looking back at me. I am so excited to actually have someone use one of my photos. Ryleigh just thought that it was so cool that she was in a book, maybe I should ask her to autograph the page for me. You can bet I'm not lending this copy out to anyone. Sparks, sparks, sparks . . . hey Jessica I better write about this!

Stories In Hand

OK, I am committed to Jessica Sprague's new class Stories In Hand, sounds like it will be a alot of fun and a chance to develop the stories of our lives that need to be told.

Jessica had a shopping list of a few items that we will need, a naked 6 x 6 binder and some 65lb card stock (white/cream/grey). I didn't really think it would be a big deal to find the binder so I headed over to my local scrapbooking store, just my luck they didn't have any but they could order one, I decided to wait. I hadn't been in the store in about a year since I have been digitally scrapbooking. Do I miss it, sure and boy was it tempting to just pick-up a few goodies, but I restrained myself and headed for the door. I was able to go online to http://www.joann.com/ and order the binder and page protectors that I would need.

I am really looking forward to telling my stories, leaving a little piece of me for my daughter. Funny thing is that I have been diligently working on my family tree for quite sometime now. My tree has grown in directions that I never fathomed it would, it has become a very addicting project. Not only am I learning names, dates and places of my ancestry but I want to know the stories of their lives, who were they, why did the immigrate, the questions are endless. I have been fortunate to find some documentation and information on my ancestors but I really believe that we need to tell our stories. Imagine the thrill of future generations who stumble across our stories . . . my ancestors will know who I am, why I do the things I do and why I wanted to leave them this gift.

Camp Counselor & Teacher Gift

Ryleigh had such a great time at the "Y" (YMCA) camp this summer we wanted to thank all her counselors for caring and being her friends. Also, when I saw this idea on www.jessicasprague.com forums from Kari karistamps.blogspot.com for a teachers gift I knew we had to put this together too! I really liked the kit Kari used Teachers Pet by Melissa Bennett and I purchased this kit also. For the counselors gift I just went thru my huge stash and found a few items that worked with the theme. I printed these out as 5" x 4" cards and folded them in half and stapled them to the cellophane treat bags that I already had on hand.

Ryleigh was so proud to take a gift for her conselors and as college students they were thrill to have a yummy snack.

Of course our real intent was to make a special treat for her new teacher, we kind of got side tracked making these for the conselors. We decided to wait to take the treats to school the evening of her first 1/2 day when they have a open house for the families. We headed for the office first and Ms. Beth the school secretary and Dr. Terry the school principle were both tickled to receive a "treat" and was her teacher Mrs. Brothers.

I filled the bags with a Peanut Butter & Butterscotch Crunch Mix, approximately 2 cups.

Peanut Butter & Butterscotch Crunch Mix

1/2 stick of butter

1 - bag of butterscotch chips - (melt together in a large pan)

add 2 large spoonfuls of peanut butter - (mix until blended over low heat)

add 1 box of Frosted Flakes

I usually add about 2 cups first and blend with a spaluta and once that is coated I continue to add about 2 cups until the I have mixed in the entire box.

Once this is all coated I have two large pieces of wax paper on my table and dump out the pan. I use a wooden flat edge spatula to break up the large chunks and let the mix cool for a hour or so. I like to refrigerate my crunch, it makes a great treat which is addictive!

Birthday Wish

I can't wait, I asked for a WACOM Bamboo Tablet for my birthday . . .

I asked the Spragueland chicks what they thought of the WACOM tablet and it was a consensus that I needed one. I thought I would start with the small tablet and see what I can do with it. Looks like alot of fun and creativity should be flowing.