Thanksgiving in Louisiana

 

I hope you all enjoyed your Thanksgiving break. After trying to play catch up on several hundred things around home we made a fast break to Louisiana. Of course I brought my camera. And of COURSE I’m going to share a few shots… I think I may blow these up a little and print them in black and white for the house. They remind me of home.

This bayou runs right in front of my parents home. I’ve never seen so little water in it. I love the color of the cypress trees in the Fall.

And this is just a random shot from their drive way. I thought the light coming through the trees was too pretty to pass up.

This Thanksgiving? I was thankful for a few days to slow down.

How was your holiday?

Weird Awkward Spooky Halloween

Sunday. All Hallow’s Eve. And I heard The Nutcracker Suite.  9 had rehearsals at 12:30 and all I saw was Halloween socks over pink tights while hearing Nutcracker music.

Weird.

As the evening progressed we finally caved into letting the girls get dressed. Did your kids wake up thinking they could don those costumes at 8am?

     

They really were cute. Even if 6 said “I’m going to be a black cat and Abby’s my witch”… said in the butIreallymeanbitch way.

We had a chili party on the street behind us… because OUR street is too lame to participate.

 

6’s sweet little crush and his baby sister… children of the host. I couldn’t resist putting their pics up… That Ally cat is just too cute.

                                         

Want to know why I brought my camera? Not to get pictures, I assure you. By taking my camera everywhere I go it allows me to sit on the outskirts of the action. I HATE parties like this… where everyone else seems to know each other and each other’s children’s names and birthdays and social security numbers.

Awkward!

I left early to set up my table. I sit and pass out candy while Hubs takes the girls around the neighborhood. I get to dress like a witch, have a few glasses of wine, and scare the neighborhood kids with my spiders and tablescape lab jars :-)

Lot’s of spiders, fun Harry Potter and Pan’s Labyrinth music, and candles… lots of candles… which was really cool…

Until someone told their kid to come look at the “alter”… I kid you not. Alter.

Pffftt… Texas…

Spooky.

Sugar Shock

It’s the day after Halloween… and bleck… do I ever regret having Snickers for dinner last night.

Here’s a shot of my little witch with her black cat :-)

I’m so glad I’ve been playing with my camera and following along with Darcy’s 31 Days to a better Photo posts. My pics are already getting to be loads better!

Happy Halloween!

Things are beginning to get a little creepy around here…

 

 

We’re nearly ready for our visitors tonight… Are you?

Have a safe and Happy Halloween!

Bored with her Hipstamom

9 is getting really testy about pictures lately. She’ll give you about a 1/3 of a second and that’s about it. Lucky for me, I’ve been learning how to shoot manual on the D90… cause I REALLY needed to figure out how to increase the shutter speed. THIS shot was a bloomin miracle because the Hipstomatic app doesn’t allow for bored 9 year olds. See there?… It’s a smile… for the camera… can you believe it?!

THIS is what she usually looks… She’ll kill me for sharing shots like this one day :-) *snicker*

Coulda been cute had she not tried to squirm out of the shot…  

And THIS is the look she gives 6… I call it her “do I really have to suffer the presence of my sister” look. Awe. SO mature.

Hey, at least I can find humor in her attitude, right?

Too cool for school

Seriously. I *may* be having a little too much fun with Hipstamatic. But it’s my blog and I’ll put as many of these shots as I want too ;-)

Baby loves her new hat.

Another one?

Y’all. I’m telling you. Hipstamatic is a SUPER fun app! If you haven’t tried it, give it a go. Lots of coolness.

Another submission to Hipstamom from the pumpkin patch… because it was just too funny not to share… 9 acting like a country girl… priceless LOL

Silly Pumpkin :-)

 

Sometimes calling somebody a Drama Queen is really just commentary on how silly they are :-)

Hipstamom Submission

Have you used the Hipstamatic camera app yet? So. Much. Fun. Old school lenses, films, and filters.

Here’s my submission shot to Hipstamom, a really cool site showing off what people are doing with the Hipstamatic app.

My Pumpkins in the pumpkins

Grainy vintage-y loveliness. 

Shooting Manual

SOOC shot

f 5.6     Tv1/100     ISO 640     98mm

 

Slightly edited shot… PW action Slight Lighten and eye’s adjusted just a bit :-)

Updated because of iHeartFaces… I’m ALWAYS finding new things to try…

THIS slight edit is using the Imagenomic Portraiture plug-in for Elements… Her skin softened, lots of noise was removed… then I popped her eyes a bit and  used PWs Slight lighten. Very pretty. I think I may buy that plug-in… I was able to see immediate improvement and it was not very complicated to use. You can download the free trial here.

I’m learning so much from Darcy it’s slightly ridiculous. Who knew all those numbers in the view finder actually MEAN something! Go check out what we’ve all been learning.

Photoshop Elements

The iHeartFaces constructive editing post really made me wonder… How can I be this dense? Surely I can figure out a freakin program… Surely? Photoshop Elements isn’t even the full blown Photoshop. Surely I can play around and figure out how to do ONE picture.

This was my test

It’s fairly cool in color… her eyes aren’t popping… it’s just off. Cute? Yes. But still… off.

Here’s what I did:

Using this tutorial and video found on iHeartFaces, I was able to make her eyes look much more vibrant. It was a bit tricky to use the magnetic lasso tool the first go around. That’s what the undo button is for, folks.

I have CoffeeShop’s Powder Room 2 action, and tried to use it. Honest. I did. But I need to read the instructions or something because I can’t figure out how to change the layers to show what the adjustments do. Huh. Moving right along.

After backtracking through what I had done (or NOT done) with the action, I started poking around in the area just above the layer information. The circle that’s shaded 1/2 gray and 1/2 white lets me change things like brightness and contrast.

Hallelujah!

I’ve been trying out how to do that on this program for AGES now! After adjusting those few things, I poked around a bit more and found out how to warm up the image using the photo filter adjustment.

So WHEW! Let’s take a look. Shall we?

By no means perfect… but I’m a happy happy girl.

I’ll keep working thru some of these actions as I am determined to figure it out. If I get any farther, I’ll let you know.

IHeartFaces is one of the many places I’ve been going to learn. It’s chock FULL of information. And, as I have learned, it’s best taken in small doses while using your own photo to walk through the learning process. I’m a hands-on kind of gal. IHeartFaces rocks.

Also?

Darcy over at My3Boybarians has been doing her 31 Days to a Better Photo series.  It is worth your time to go start at the beginning of the month and work your way through them. I’ve printed every day so far. Darcy has a knack for putting things in a way that even I can understand them… Darcy is also a rock star.

Happy shooting!

Future Tigers – Wordless Wednesday

 

Trying to be as wordless as possible…

Sometimes you’ve got to get on your knees and just go for the shot.

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UPDATE: I am so happy to have just stumbled into the iheartfaces post today. I edited this shot and I am TERRIBLE at editing. I used the Canon Digital Professional software that came with my point and shoot to work on this one. I have PSE6, but I know squat about how to use it. I KNOW it can be a better picture, but I just don’t understand Photoshop Elements.

iheartfaces has a linky set up for constructive criticism. I would SO appreciate some help. I’m still a newbie on my first DSLR and only on occasion am getting the kind of shots I want. Heck. Most of the time they look AWFUL.

The original photo information:

ISO: 400

Tv: 1/160

Av: F13.0

Flicker Link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/25332409@N08/5062637576/

I SO wanted this to be a more vibrant shot. The sky color was BEAUTIFUL that day… it just doesn’t show in the picture. I will say that I was LITERALLY on my knees shooting behind me so that the girls didn’t know I was shooting them.

Any help offered is greatly appreciated! Thanks iheartfaces for this opportunity!

Geaux Tigers!

Hubs and I both went to LSU. We loved, lived, and breathed LSU. Our babies’ birth announcements were both LSU themed.

We brought 9 as an infant to a tailgate party. I was still breastfeeding at that time and had to escape to my car to pump. It was sheer misery. It was so much Hell that we never took them back.

Until this weekend. You know… for the Tennessee game that ended in one of the most effed up victories I’ve ever seen or heard of. Yeah. THAT game :-)

I called my sister and she met us in Baton Rouge. It was awesome to see her. I’m sure my girls chatted her ear off and probably even scared her a little. My kids are… insane exuberant. A bonus to having your sister meet you? You get to be in pictures :-)

      

         

Boy did they have an awesome time. The look on 9s face when the Golden Girls marched down the hill… Priceless. 6 got so crazy and into it that she yelled “Tiger Bait!” & “Peace out! Tennessee!” at some of the Tennessee fans… Sorry folks… We didn’t teach her that one… 

    

And because my sister is a genius at coming up with clever pics we got THIS shot…

What a weekend. We are still trying to recover. It was so amazing to have our girls walk around campus with us and have them actually enjoy being there. At one point we realized that there’s a good chance both of the girls will be there for a couple of years together… in that crowd… as students… I nearly got teary until one coed sloshed up next to us and told us how cute the little Tigers were through liquored up breath. That’s just NOT something this Momma is ready to think about… Especially with THIS one…

Yeah. She’s a lil crazy. She’ll need a very VERY short leash.

Relax!

It’s finally the weekend.  It’s time to RELAX! Enjoy your football games and Fall weather!

 

I am a baker, not a decorator

Kim has a linky set up for cakes and cupcakes… Oh MAN is my sweet tooth killing me right now… Looking at all of her yum-o pictures REALLY makes me want to bake. Alas, I have dance class to shuffle the kids to this evening. I thought about baking I’ve done…

  

I think it’s pretty evident that I am a baker… NOT a decorator… I can’t pipe frosting to save my life. Maybe it’s lack of practice, or too much caffeine… I just can’t get the hang of it. That’s why I try to find other ways to decorate cupcakes and cakes… The truffle filled seashell chocolates are STILL my favorite stroke of genius.

Kim is having a giveaway tomorrow… Friday, Sept. 24th. It’s for this sweet baby… The Martha Stewart Cricut for Cake…

Now, I’ll be honest… Kim’s got like 5 million followers so I’m not gonna cross my fingers about winning this one, so I’ll probably never have one. But don’t you know I could make a gorgeous cake using this thing!!!! It would really make decorating so much fun. I can just see free standing swirls on top of butter cream frosting… Endless possibility.

Sweet 6 – Wordless Wednesday

Dear Santa…

The other day I was hanging with the family in the pool and the girls wanted to talk about Disney. Yes, we are indeed THAT family. The family who’s 9 year old is about to take her 11th trip to the World. Trust me. My kids could plan your entire trip, guide you around the entire Disney World property without a map, and tell you all of the best sit down restaurants and which has a good lobster bisque. Really. We are a little bit psycho about planning our trips… down to the very last minute detail. Planning is half the fun when it comes to Disney.  We even plan to have “unplanned time”… seriously. I’m not very anal about many things, but a trip to Disney World just puts me in a tizzy.

As the girls started talking about what we were going to do and where we were going to stay, the BIG question came up…

How on Earth is Santa going to visit us at Disney World?  

Let me preface this by saying that I generally tell my kids the truth. When my oldest was 5 and asked what a period was, I told her.  I usually answer the questions. I do not give them more information than they need. I give them enough information to satisfy their curiosity and then move on… I just don’t believe in lying to them…  Except when it comes to the magic of being a child.

Mommy?

Yes, Jillian.

Is Santa real?

Do you get real gifts?

Yeah.

Well then, what do you think?

I think you and daddy are Santa.

Shows what you know, kid. Daddy’s cheap. He wouldn’t buy you extra presents just to pretend to be Santa.

Oh.

Yeah.

Well, then how’s Santa going to know which hotel room is ours?

Abby – Duh. He’s MA-GIC…

Ooohhh.  Yeah… MA-GIC… Well, I still think he needs a sign or sumthin…just to be sure he finds us…

Abby – and maybe some extra special Disney cookies… like chocolate dipped rice crispie Mickey heads.

We can get a Santa Stop Here sign and put it outside of our door. I’m sure that will work.

And then he can leave us lots of gifts! …

You know what’s really cool to do? Ask Santa to surprise you. If you don’t ask for anything and just tell him to surprise you, you’ll usually get something totally awesome… *cough*likeafriggintriptoDisneyWorld*cough*

Abby & Jillian – AWESOME!!!!

I said I didn’t lie… on important things… but I will work them for as long as I possibly can.

So who has some suggestions for small packable and easily concealed awesome Christmas presents for a 6 year old? 9 is getting a Kindle…

 

Flower hair pin tutorial

It’s nearly time for college football to begin. Around here it’s all SEC all the time. Unless it’s Sunday, then it’s all about the Saints. Our fall schedules revolve around football games. This year that is especially true because this is the first year we are taking the girls into Death Valley. When they were little we brought them to tailgate, but never into the actual stadium. I’m pretty sure they are going to be BLOWN AWAY. 

The girls wanted some hair pins to wear with their “gear” for the football games. You aren’t a true fan unless you are spackled in Purple and Gold from head to toe. For the girls, we picked flowers.

Cheap. $3.50 for the whole bundle cheap. It had the necessary colors, so I grabbed them up.

 

Pop the flowers off of the plastic stem bundle and pull the backing and front fuzzy buttons off. I used 6 flowers to make 2 pins, so I sorted the petal layers by size.

Re-layer your petals with the largest diameter on the bottom. Using a needle and thread, stitch the flower layers back together. I topped my petals with a football shank style button.

After the button has been sewn onto the layers, continue to stitch  back through the layers coming out the back side of the petals. Stitch several passes through the bent end of the hair pins.

I squeezed a bit of glue to the back thread and under the football button to ensure it says flat.

Easy peasy. And cute too, No?

  

I couldn’t be left out, so using the same technique, I made two styles of yo-yos out of gold tulle, layered them together, sewed a bobby pin to the back and added some bling.

This is so darn easy, there’s no reason to not be properly styled for football games… or the playground… or the mall… or the… well, you get it. 

 

For the 3rd week in a row I’m linking up to Kim’s Get Your Craft On. This is some kind of record, I’m sure. :-)