Add a little color to your life
Today is Super Games and the boys are so excited. I get to head over there in a bit to man the snow cone machine.
Tonight we have Blake’s soccer party here so there are going to be some tired boys here later.
The sweet middle child, who was being not so sweet yesterday tormenting his little brother.
Speaking of tormenting, my dogs crack me up.
All they do is play and sleep.
The dogwood is blooming in the front yard- so pretty.
So that’s all for now- Happy Weekend!
So here is one from yesterday.
Eek he looks big.
And a couple others
this is a hosta flower- thought it looked kinda cool
Flowers from my mom- I pulled one out and stuck it in the lamp.
This always makes me laugh- and think of you Kathy.
And before you call me up and ask me if I am moving (mom), no- just overwhelmed with 3 birthday parties to plan, a party this Friday night to plan, workers at the house, end of the year parties and activities, my washing machine died over the weekend, oh and a business to run.
June is crazy around here-
I am so ready to head to Texas and do some boogie boarding with my boys.
My SIL Kathy and I often talk about how we should live in the same city. But it has never worked out that way.
When I lived in Austin, she lived in Seattle. And when she moved to Austin, I moved to Ohio.
So we raised our three kids in different cities- always commenting about how it would have been cool to raise them together.
And since my husband never checks out his sister’s blog, I will post her pictures here. I know she does this (well at least in my own mind) to lure us back. Because Austin really is one of the coolest cities ever.
And I do miss tubing down the Guadalupe River in San Marcos. The crystal clean river- so unlike the mucky brown ones we have here.
I am trying to figure out how she took a camera with her without getting it wet.
Ohhhh I see, a ziplock bag.
This is Max on the blue tube. He is Blake’s twin, only not quite as dark- and just three months older.
This is Joey, the crazy blonde 3rd born
and this is Miss Emma the oldest, 6 months older than Austin.
And this is for anyone who doesn’t think Texas is beautiful.
Now, if we could just move all family members to one city we would be all set.
Such a great weekend around here.
Just some pics from the parade today
On the way there
Austin at the parade
the walk home
Hope everyone had a good one.
Austin has started doing jobs for our neighbors. It started over the winter when one went to Florida, now he is mowing lawns
Grandad will be happy to see that he has ear, eye, and feet protection.
Cole was happy that his dad came home at a decent time
short and tall- watching from our back porch that is getting an over-haul
Doesn’t this look like fun?
Happy Long weekend
for this year anyway
A little face painting that was smeared in the first 30 seconds
and a little sandbox fun
School’s out for summer, for boy number three anyway.
We are all in this together (catchy jingle). Anyway Tracy made a comment on the blog today that said
I have been subscribing to your blog for a while and I am finally getting the guts up to ask how you make the edges of your photos shaded. Your photos are AMAZING! I am assuming you are using photoshop but I just can’t figure it out!!! If you have a chance to answer I would appreciate it alot!
Don’t be afraid to ask, because while some photographers are all hush hush about how they get their effects, I like to share the love. I know that each individual will take their own unique shots because everyone has a different way of looking at the world. And I really think that shows through in photography.
So…..the picture that was on the post that Tracy commented on was done with Photoshop by using layers to get that Through The Viewfinder look of old vintage cameras. There are two ways to do this, actually take a picture through an old camera (which is not all that easy- I tried it with my vintage Rolleicord and the effect was cool, but not what I really wanted). The second way is to do it through PS. I did a post about the “how-to” part a while back, maybe last month. I collect different “textures” from people on flickr that post them for others to use and then play around with them when I have the time. So far I have been using the same ones over and over. You can google Through The Viewfinder or TTV and find all kinds of info out there.
Now, that said- I recently discovered a very very cool site call Picnik
I LOVE this site. It basically takes all the work out of doing everything step by step in PS, plus it’s free! At least for the basic level. I am considering the upgrade, it’s only $25 a year and then you also get curves- which is what I use a lot on PS. When you get on the site, upload a photo and then hit the create tab. I use the vignette effect for the shaded corners. It will also slightly change the color. The other fun one is cinema and 1960’s.
I would show you some of the fun stuff that I have done but I don’t know how to copy image location on the Mac yet.
Photography is so fun, I could talk about it all day. It’s crazy when I think about all the time spent in a darkroom when I was young. Now it’s all so easy, and far less stinky!
And Jim, I knew you would be happy to hear we crossed back to your side of the world. Can’t wait to see you guys next month at the beach! I will be bringing my new toy (which I should probably say is nothing fancy- just a plain old MacBook) but you can fill me in on all the fun stuff I have been missing.
And I don’t even have a picture to show you!
Don’t worry, it’s not another dog.
It’s a pretty new laptop, one with the name of a fruit.
We have been having computer issues for SO LONG.
Our two desk-tops and one laptop have all been acting up. I wish I could show Michael Dell some love since we went to the same school and all (and before Andy went down the women’s underwear road I really thought it might be the place for him to work) but no- we have had one issue after the other.
Besides all the iPod issues (you know that is huge in a house where there are so many different iPods- and the computer would make them all crash) we also were having daily wireless issues and just internet issues in general. It would take an hour each morning just to get it to connect because it was finicky, then you could ever turn it off because you would never be able to get it back. Then a couple days ago the desk-top went ka-poot and the laptop refused to connect. Period.
Obviously if you run an internet biz this is not a good thing.
So now I am learning the ropes of the Apple world. Again. It has been a long time since I had an apple. I actually have always preferred Apples and I talked Andy into one a long time ago but then he talked me into a PC and we stayed with those.
A couple other things
For those waiting for orders, Mondays shipment was delayed due to no computer, they will all go out tomorrow.
And if your name is Jordy and you happen to be my niece, this message is for you-
If you ever come to Columbus and don’t call me AGAIN you will be in big big trouble. 
Not a big fan but since we hadn’t been since we got free tickets from the office where I worked at UT, I figured we would take the boys and see if anything has changed. It hasn’t. I still don’t like it. I actually got tears in my eyes watching those big cats flinch when their “trainer” came near them. But I won’t get on my animal rights soapbox.
The boys seemed to enjoy themselves.
And these guys were cool
