Follower Swap

and

I know I have already posted twice today but I wanted to give a huge shout out to to SJ at  Homemaker on a Dime for having this great blog follower swap every week and for featuring me today. I joined Homemaker on a Dime last week and let me tell you, it is the best blog hop I have “attended”. All my new followers have similar tastes but also the kind of fellow bloggers that you can reach out to. Thank you SJ. And for those of you that would like to find and receive new followers, go check out Homemaker on a Dime.

iHeart Faces

Any level photographer can join in on the iheart faces fun. Every week they have a different challenge that you can enter a picture into. No matter what the theme there also has to be a human face in the picture. You also have to enter a different picture every time. This week the theme is the best of January. I happen to have the perfect picture from this weekend to enter. My son got to go swimming. I was trying to capture him jumping in but I have yet to get the timing right on the shutter time. But this “walrus” looking picture is much better.

 

 

 

Bliss

I was going to enter this picture until I saw the one of my son.

365 Days of Photos

I didn’t think to post a week’s worth in one post instead of posting just 1 a week. =) Since I am behind, here are all the pictures up to this week I have posted on my Facebook.

#1 A little love vignette

#2 Kaci

#3 A editing opp

#4 The tip of the Sandia Mountains

#5 Taken in the garden section of Home Depot

#6 A friendly reminder

#7 Before glazing

#8 Part of Stephanie Ackerman’s Doodle 101

#9 Self portrait, haircut

#10 Kaci

#11 A billboard I passed on I40

#12 I40 and I25 Interchange

#13 My first glazing progect

Joys of Life

When joy has a reason,
it is not going to last long.
But when joy is without any reason,
it is going to be there forever.

~~Osho, 1931-1990; Indian Spiritual Leader

Love Ticket

I was walking around in Hobby Lobby the other day, as I often do. I just don’t like that there are only a few friendly people there and that almost ALL their stuff is made in China. So I saw these love tickets in the Valentine’s aisle and I thought what a great idea, but they were rather blah. (Sorry, someone else was standing there so I didn’t get the greatest picture.)

I went home and searched my mom’s wood and found the perfect piece. Instead of cutting the rounded edges, I just marked them off and painted them black, and then scallop cut a piece of paper and used that for a stencil on the end edges. Painted the rest pink. Textured with a darker pink and distressed the whole thing. I drew the middle outlines and colored in the X and Os. Then added the heart stickers.

I loved this part so much I wasn’t sure I wanted to do anything else to it. I thought about just putting LOVE, or just a big heart. I could always make another one. I finally settled on what to do.

Admit 2  4 Love!

 

           

Photo Editing

Every once in awhile I do the photo challenge with The Creative Crate. Today Stacie posted a picture to edit. That way everyone edited the same picture. I just used Picasa and then did a little more editing in Picnik.

The original picture

My edited version

I cropped the photo, then did the Auto Contrast in Picasa. From there I went into Picnik and did the Vignette under Effects. Then I added the paw prints in stickers.

Knockoff decor

We all love us some knockoff décor, a much smaller chunk of change of a great designer’s work. Pottery Barn inspiration seems to be a big one. I joined the masses and made some Pottery Barn knockoff candle holders, which can be found here. I decided to enter them in the America Crafters challenge . You have one more day to enter if you haven’t already.

My candle holders are also being featured on Knock Off Decor on Friday. If you haven’t added Knock Off Decor to your reader, you really should. Beckie posts some amazing knockoffs.

*~*~*~*~*My feature can be found here.

Rosette Frames

January’s Create With Me at UCreate is Rosette Frames. I am barely making it under the wire. I have been finished with the one but was waiting on the other one to be finished.

(I think something might be wrong with my new camera, the shutter time slows way down half way through the picture and they come out a little blurry half the time =(.) I hung these above my craft table. Inspiration.

This one I painted and sealed the frame, printed out my words on Word and used Duck for the rosettes. I decided to try something new and I brushed Mod Podge on the small one and then sprinkled with tiny beads. I know next time not to spread the Mod Podge on the whole thing. On the bigger one I rolled it around on blue stamping ink and then used Diamond Dust in the middle. A dragonfly rhinestone, followed by bead dots.

On this one I painted the edges and part of the face of the plaque and distressed. I printed out the subway art from Not Just a Housewife on cardstock. I then Mod Podged it onto the plaque. I also put about 4 layers of Mod Podge on the top. Attached the buttons and rosette, and a ribbon to the back to hang it from. I made this rosette out of sweater and glued a brad into the middle.

           

Hoo are you?

I am totally skipping Tutorial Tuesday today to participate in

I had fun reading some of the other entries and thought I would play along.

1. Do you wear glasses or contacts, if so for how long? I had to start wearing glasses in college because I couldn’t see the boards at the front of the room. Low prescription at first. I started wearing contacts a few years later and right am back to only glasses because I can’t afford contacts (or the eye doctor) at the moment. That is my first expense when I finally get a job. Luckily I can read without glasses.

 2. What was your favorite board game as a kid? I would say, hands down, Monopoly but I think we played more card games, like Uno. Phase 10 was a hit in our house when it came out.

3. What is a word that you use all the time? Apparently I say apparently too much, according to my mom.

4. What is your favorite day of the week? Thursday, it’s the day that has always had a good show on TV. Used to be Friends and ER…Tuesday is a good TV night too. In college, Thursdays was also the cheap night to go out dancing, I got to be a pretty darn good two-stepper.

5. Did you graduate high school from the town you grew up in? The town where I graduated from high is the 3rd city I lived in, but I went to school there from 5th grade until part of community college. I will never live in that town again.