New Blog

Why a new blog now? Well, I need to protect my kids lives a little better, and I needed to be able to make some posts private. However, I don't mind people reading some other things. In the course of going and making a new blog, which has been an almost 2 year process, I had originally planned to debut it when we'd had Katie for a year. That obviously didn't happen. Then, I thought, 18 months...that has passed as well.

The penny story, and the ER doctor, and such NEED a little protection. I'm still feeling a little too vulnerable about them. So, here is the link to the new blog...I will be leaving this blog up for awhile longer.

http://somebodyneedsanap.wordpress.com/

I know I have extended family who read the blog and friends who don't comment, if you send me an email (which I'll get if you leave a comment here) and let me know you need the passwords I'll be happy to send them on.

There are several passwords, and I think if you enter them once then until the cookies are cleared on your computer you won't have to re-enter them.

One set is for photos of the kids, and daily life with the kids.

Each child has their own specific code, and that is for family only as I talk specifically about the kids activities and where we live. Many of those posts will be duplicated but with less photos, or such. I suspect there will be few of them...very few, but things like Samuel's Kindergarten graduation photo with his certificate...KWIM? Or first day of school with the school sign...that kind of thing.

Adoption related posts that have info specifically about how Katie is doing, those are under a separate code.

Our Disney vacation is under a code for Disney.

Then any photography/photoshop post has it's own code IF it has a photo of my children in it. These will be mostly for past history ones.

I mainly did all the codes like that because I have watermarks of this blog name on those photos in the posts. I'm working hard to clear out those and replace them as I don't want people directed back to here....except eventually this blog will become "private" so only I have access. I expect that will take a few months though.

Any questions?

OH, if you leave a comment with an email I promise NOT to post that comment!

New Blog is almost ready....

I'm going to be moving my postings to a new blog soon. I'm working on the importing of this blog, making all 2008 and before posts private, changing the kids names to nicknames, etc. :) Long process...but almost done! FINALLY...then I'll talk about the doctor's comment.

Katie's bday invitation

I've been working on Katie's birthday party invitations today, and I used some photos from a recent "session" with her...if you can call it a session. She gives me literally 5-10 minutes and poses, faces, etc. MUST be her idea. I get whatever she decides to give me. In this particular session I got maybe 2-3 that I would give to grandparents/family, but as we have one we just did for all the family I'm not worrying about fully editing them.

Here are 2 I particularly liked as they show a little bit of Katie's personality:




I will definitely have to show you all the final photo invite when I figure it out. I'll also show you a few others from this particular session.

*details - canon5d 24-105 lens, 100% natural light - window to the left of Katie and white reflector to the right of Katie. This is shot in my dining room with the dining room table removed. ;)

Sorry I've been MIA

I've had an interesting week, well, actually just a really wild and crazy Monday followed by a few days of recovering! Suffice it to say that Katie really really really keeps us on our toes. The up side to her latest adventure is that she let me cradle her for 30 minutes in the rocking chair while she looked into my eyes and patted my cheek or played with my hair. Yeah, I melted. The down side is that she completely and totally regressed in the potty training, we had her TRAINED and she slid backward completely. We're slowly getting there again.

I also have a major VENT/RANT with a question of what I could have said to a doctor. I'm still upset about the comment. I love Katie's response though, and it was that response that made me realize she DOES hear and understand what is being said around her.

Lots and lots and lots going on...

I promise that I'll have fireworks and 4th of July photos up soon! ;)

Happy Birthday America!

I hope each of you in the United States have an AWESOME 4th of July! Lots of family time, summer cookouts, swimming, fireworks...mosquitos, cranky kids, sensory overloaded kids...ah...the stuff of awesome summer memories.

Looking forward to seeing and sharing photos next week!!!!

Photoshop - tutorial on grunge brushes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrcFJSdg6Pg

That's Sam Puc's tutorial on the Quarantine Collection. :) VERY awesome to watch someone go through the steps. However, I wonder if those who aren't familiar with photoshop will get as much as I did. IF you get lost at any point of it, please let me know through comments and I will do a post on that step.

You will need to full size that, but I didn't catch her actions very well on some of them (like creating a new layer). In a previous photoshop post I've mentioned how to make a new layer, and add layer masks. I can update this post with those steps as well if you like.

1 - not sure where to get the overlays, and what they are doing with those. Will need to research that. I've never done much at all with grunge brushes and overlays period, I just have never tended to like the look. High school seniors though? They love the look.

2 - I am purchasing these, and will do a post of my working with these grunge brushes soon.

Remember, here is where you can purchase the brushes...

Nemo and friends

Yes, we have Nemo and friends vinyl clings gracing the windows of our van. Katie loves them. Me? Not so much. Do I even have to mention how many time I go to look back to my left to see if there is a car there and I see NEMO out of the corner of my eye?! Yeah.

These photos could also be explained by the phrase, "what happens when you give Samuel the camera." At least I'm shielding you all from the horrors of my van. Or maybe I shouldn't? It would earn me a spot in 3Channels blog.



*quick click away if messy disorganized vehicles cause your OCD to kick in, as obviously I don't suffer from that particular problem*






Explanation - pink swimming bag with swim stuff like sunscreen, Katie's diaper bag, a towel from said swimming, a box for the pool toys (which you thankfully can not see here), a Karate bo, a bible from church that must not have made it inside (okay it stays in the van so we always have it), water bottles from the pool, a wiffle ball from the baseball going days, a capri sun pouch (from when we went to karate), umbrella, paper from the summer camp science classes, pencils, cup from dinner out recently...

Please tell me I'm not the only one whose van looks like this! LOL It's not nearly so bad at the moment, but only because I cleaned it out when we went to my parents for the week. Sometimes though, I feel like we LIVE in that van we're on the go so much.

Just trust me when I say, I spared you from MORE of the same! Exactly the same, I think he took 5 photos of the mess on the floor.

Wordless Wednesday