Valentine Fun

There isn't much going on these days that is blog worthy, so I thought I'd share some Valentine "art" just for fun.

 

I tried another attempt at subway art. I made this using different Picasa fonts.

I had this small vase stored away and when I unpacked it this week I noticed that the heart had turned a very lovely rusty patina. I played with the different effects in Picnik for this picture.

Saturday was cloudy but I took a few pictures of the lovely pink roses. I needed a few fillers but the only thing in the yard right now that would work was the variegated euonymus. It has a sweet pink blush this time of year, so it was perfect.

I hope that your nest is filled with love this week! I know, I know, way too cheesy! :-)

Thanks for stopping by!

No Picnik

I was sad to read yesterday that Picnik was closing in April. Until they close they are offering their free Premium effects to everyone.

One of my goals for the year is to learn textures on Adobe Photoshop Elements. I played with a few of the textures offered on Picnik and I really like the way they look.

I took this picture of the chickadee on Friday and added texture and the frame on Picnik..

This winter I have been busy in the kitchen learning to make things that I would normally buy. Between the cost of gas and groceries, I am really having to pinch pennies these days. Even though I am southern and my grandmother and mother always cooked their biscuits from scratch, that gene kind of skipped me. I have always bought them frozen, (and even canned). I love to bake bread, so it really bothered me that I couldn't make decent biscuits. I think I handle the dough too much for them to be light and fluffy and rise like they should. Determined to make them, Saturday I tried two different recipes. One was acceptable but the second one was exceptional!The bad thing is that now I can't find the recipe online. I thought for sure I saved it to Pinterest. At least I have the ingredients penned on a piece of paper!

Speaking of pinching pennies, Jen, from Muddy Boot Dreams, is joining Brenda, from Cozy Little House, along with a few other ladies,  for a series on Thrifty Living 2012. I am looking forward to reading their blog posts on living more frugally!
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Photography Fun

This is one of my favorite pictures from my archives. I made the flower arrangement with a variety of flowers from my garden and placed them in a pretty silver bowl that I found at a garage sale.

I enjoy taking my photographs and putting Bible verses or quotes on them and creating cards to give to family and friends; I also have several of them enlarged and framed in my home.

I am enjoying the cooler weather that we've had these last two days! It has been a warmer than usual August here in Indiana and the lower temperatures are so refreshing. It is nice to have the windows open again. With the cooler temperatures my thoughts are on all of the projects that need to be completed inside and out in a few short months. Enough thinking, I guess I had better get off the computer and start painting!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Playing with Picasa 3- First Collage

~~~~~~PEONIES 2008~~~~~~


Just doing a bit of creative play today with Picasa 3. I've done collages using Adobe Photoshop Elements, but I prefer the look of the collages done with Picasa3. It is a free download and pretty easy to learn.

Thanks for the Backup Suggestions

Thanks everyone for the comments regarding my post on backing up my picture files.



It seems that multiple locations is the way to go to safely store those images! I'm purging files by necessity. I think maybe I'm overwhelming my system by trying to copy too much at one time. None of the DVD programs that I've tried can handle my file load. I even purchased Simple Save by Memorex and it can only handle a 10 DVD maximum. At least its winter and there is nothing to do outside and it gives me a chance to look at all of the pictures that warm my heart and make me happy.



I did get over 9000 images safely transferred to the laptop from the external drive. Hopefully the rest of the images are stored safely in the drive.

As Sylvia reminded us, sometimes things can happen that can destroy even our external drives and DVDs. My friend just recently lost her family home to a fire, during the recent ice storm in Kentucky. Her family lost everything. So, this has already been on my mind. Once I get the computer issues taken care of, I'll be checking into the other online sources for additional backup.

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Back Up and Try Again

My computer has been making some very strange noises off and on for the last couple of months. I get in a near panic mode each time I hear this noise as I think about all of the photos on my computer that have not been backed-up. There are over 30,000 pictures on my computer, most of which I could just delete and never miss, but others that I would be very sad to lose.

Those pictures that I've used on my blog are safely backed up on Picasa, but they are stored at a lower resolution than I would want should I decide to use them for prints. My computer is not letting me use DVDs for copying. It correctly makes one, (out of 14), DVDs and then I get an error message for the next one. I just purchased an external drive and have attempted to use it but when downloading my pictures onto the laptop I get an error message for that as well. This is so frustrating! I have spent hours the last few days just trying to get my things backed up. I'm not 100% certain that I have been successful yet.

I was just wondering if you back up your pictures and if so, what method do you use?

No Winter Lasts Forever

I've seen this quote by Hal Borland several times recently. After the snow and bitter cold temperatures this past week I needed another reminder. I'm very tired of winter and so ready for spring!

Thank you all for your sweet and thoughtful comments. Your joy and relief over the new job has truly warmed my heart. It is so incredible to have people, most that you've never even met, pulling for you and rejoicing with you. You all are amazing!

Photo Editing and Photography

Now that the weather is cooler and some days downright freezing cold, I'm focusing my attention on a few new hobby projects. I am so inept when it comes to technology and most instructions are way over my head, not only that, I am the type of person who has to learn these kinds of things hands on. In regards to technology, I sometimes feel like Rip Van Winkle, like I've been asleep for twenty years and woke up to a brand new world, where everything is so different, so complicated. Some of these things though are definitely worth taking the to time to learn.

As I've mentioned before, I love to go to Barnes and Noble to read, study, look at home and garden magazines and have a Starbucks drink. I went one day this week and the topic of interest for me was photo editing. I looked through several books on Photoshop Elements 5, which is my editing software, and I found a couple of books that I really liked. Sometimes, when something is totally new to me, like photography or photo editing, I have to read the same things over and over, sometimes worded in different ways, and slowly they start to make sense to me. I sometimes have to immerse myself in the topic for this to understanding to take place. Anyway, that is one reason for fewer blog post this week, I've been preoccupied with reading, studying and playing with PE5, I've also babysat most of the week and my spare time was limited.

One thing I finally learned how to do was create a collage and post it using PE5. This won't be my favorite method for posting most pictures, since the individual pictures can't be enlarged. Although it sure saves me time on blogger by only having to download, (or is that upload), one item, especially as in the case of the bird pictures that were taken from either inside the house or from a long distance away and weren't that great to begin with.

My new project now is to learn more about photo restoration. I picked up the book Photoshop Elements Restoration & Retouching Book by Matt Kloskowski, which has clear step-by-step instructions that I think I can follow. Last year as a Christmas present to my extended family, I scanned all of the old pictures of the family, (I've always been the holiday family photographer), and put them on a CD with music. It was very sweet and sad too, in fact the Butterfly Kisses song with the pictures of granddaughters as they were growing up was a tearjerker. Some of the pictures were old though and could have used some retouching. I also have all of my mom's pictures and my mother-in-law's and would love to restore those that are in bad shape and put them on a CD for the family members who might want a copy. This, I know will be a time consuming project and now is the perfect time to take it on.

I've also joined a local photography club and look forward to learning new things there too. The next class is on shooting photos in and with candle light.

Maybe I'll actually use my new craft room and do some scrapbooking or sewing this winter. I also have stacks of new religious and gardening books waiting to be read and other books I've already read that I'd love to review again. I do miss the warm sunshine and being outside this time of year, but I also enjoy cuddling up with a book on those cold gray days. Being from the south, I'm kind of like a bear and I hibernate in the winter, so I have my projects ready to begin, and my books and favorite quilt in my den just waiting for those cozy winter days.

I'm not sure how much blog posting I'll be able to do over the winter, I'm not sure I'll have anything to take pictures of or much to say. I'll be very interested to see what other garden bloggers do during the winter months. I guess that is one great benefit to those who enjoy writing, they are so creative and probably never run out of things to blog about. They, along with the southern gardeners, hopefully will keep us entertained, informed and connected through the winter months.

Photographing Flowers

Several people have asked me about my pictures and Pam from Digging asked if I could show some before and after examples of the adjustments that I make using Photoshop Elements. I feel funny doing a post on this because I am such an amateur myself, but I am an avid reader and love to learn new things so I have picked up a few good tips that have worked well for me. So, I'll pass that along to those of you who are interested.

Photography Tips:

*Always try to capture your landscape or flowers either in the late evening or early morning hours. The pictures will not turn out well in mid-day, they will have a glare and the colors will not show up as well. I love to take pictures after a rain shower on a cloudy day, they are the best.

*I never use a tripod because it is very difficult to get low enough to photograph flowers with one. I do try to steady my hands on something, be it a rock or birdbath or my knee or shoe while I'm sitting or kneeling on the ground. Any kind of movement will cause blurry pictures.

* Most cameras have a macro mode or a little flower which indicates a macro mode. This is what I use almost all of the time to get clear close up shots. Don't use the flash with macro. With my cameras you can't zoom in at all with macro, it goes out of focus.

*Get on the same level with the flowers, even if you have to sit in the dirt.

* Digitals are great because you can literally take hundreds of shots and choose the best ones, which is what I do many times. You can also check to see if you're getting good shots and adjust things accordingly.

*Keep the camera handy so you won't miss those unexpected photo opportunities. I'm so glad I had my camera in my pocket while I was gardening or I would have missed the great hot air balloon shot.

* I also always shoot in the auto mode, (this lets everyone know for real that I am but an amateur). Right now though, the camera is smarter than I am and usually gets the job done for me.

Photoshop Elements tips (you could do these same simple adjustments with any photo editing program):

Here is the before shot of the Ranunculas; I did two separate adjustments to get the final picture.

Here is the first "after" picture:
I always use the easy quick fix feature. I always sharpen the focus a bit, then I lighten shadows, or if there is a glare I will darken it a bit and sometimes if I need to I will adjust the mid-tones. I will also sometimes use the color saturation feature if my colors are more dull than they should be. This feature doesn't change the color it just brightens it and helps the flowers to look the way they originally did in the garden. The over all one thing that makes the biggest difference is lightening the shadows. It makes a huge difference in all of my pictures.
Here is the final product after cropping it to bring it in closer.

Here is another example using the same method. minus the cropping, with this picture of the lantana.

Subtle difference but it looks better than the original. Hope this helps.