August according to my phone

Continuing the monthly instragram sized look back of random stuff that I took photos of on my phone, I realized that August was a busy month!  It started out slow with some randomness and lots of rain and clouds.  It ended with Kiera starting Kindergarten, two fairs, and a birthday party.  Of course there was plenty in between.

July according to my phone

Taking my inspiration from one of my favorite bloggers Karli Bonnie at the Bonnie 5, I decided to post Instragram size photos summarizing what I took photos of for the last month.  I got my new smart(er) phone at the end of July so this is the first time that I have done a post like this.  There are only a few photos this month, but I can assure you that the numbers will grow in the not so distant (August) future.  So for now enjoy a brief look into the last week of July 2013.

I went to dust...

But ended up making a wreath instead.

I am not really sure how the thought process went from dusting a shelf to making a pink and purple feather boa wreath for my daughter's sleepover... but it did.  

I started by cutting a circle out of a cardboard box that was just lying in my garage.  As you can see, it doesn't really matter if the circles are perfect.  If you are going to use this post as a tutorial to make your own wreath, please do not focus on perfection here.  No need. 

I then rolled up some grocery bags loosely and used clear tape to tape them to the board.  Again, do not focus on perfection.  I just wanted to add a little bit of padding to make the wreath look more full. 

These are feather boas that I confiscated from my daughter's dress up box.  I hate these things.  They came from the dollar store and they shed feathers all over the place.  You cannot stop it, nor can you contain it.  You can see some of the bare spots where the feathers have all fallen out.

The dark purple one was by far the highest quality one... it was still full and it was the longest.  I used it as the base and wrapped it all the way around the circled board.  I then took the multi colored boas and filled in the gaps.  I only had one light purple one and wasn't sure how to make it look like it belonged so I turned it into a sort of boa flower.

You can't really tell in the photo but the light purple one is hooked to the front of the wreath and not wrapped around the circles like the other boas.

This was the first wreath of this kind that I have made, and I am rather proud of it.  I hope you like it too.

July 4th/ Rodeo Parade

Last Saturday, my daughter and I went to the Rodeo parade.  She loves horses so she would get excited everytime a new batch of them came down the street.  She really liked to see the rodeo queens/princesses and the Rodeo Rounders.  The Rounders are our local version of the Sweethearts.  (If you have ever seen the movie Cowgirls and Angels you know who they are... if you have not seen it you really should watch it)  Kiera would really like to be a stunt rider right now.  She is always trying to do the hippodrome on her rocking horse.  (Again if you have seen the movie you know the trick.)  We had a great time together.

Sunday Scavenger Hunt

I have to admit that this weeks prompts were harder than they should have been for me.  The colors mostly. I wanted to avoid a photo that had all the colors in them, like say a flag.  And I have plenty of White and Blue things around my house, but didn't think that taking a photo of the shampoo bottle would really set the right tone.  I did finally come up with a photo for each prompt... although they may not be my best.  Without further ado...

Red

My daughter and I attended our local rodeo parade this past weekend.  Afterwards they were having an antique car show.  My father-in-law loves Corvettes so we decided to take him a photo.  The one we found just happened to be red.

White

This is the photo that I had the most difficulty with.  I found this seeding plant on the playground to my daughter's school when we went there to play.  It was white.  It works.

Blue

Nothing says long weekend like a blueberry martini.  They are so sweet (almost too much) and so pretty.

Stars

My daughter recently got an ice tray that makes star shaped ice.  How could I not use that for Stars?

Sparkle

We had a wonderful 4th.  We saw beautiful fireworks, ate good food, and played (that was mostly Kiera though).

Oh Snap! photo of the week

Of course this week was the Fourth of July, so everyone will have their own fireworks shots.  My family was invited to a very large BBQ get together.  This photo was taken at the beginning of the show so it was still just slightly light out.  This is one of my favorite shots from the hundred or so photos that I took that night.

By the way:
In case anyone was wondering the settings that I used were f/16; ISO 100; SS 2.5 as suggested in this post by Courtney at Click It Up A Notch.

Sunday Scavenger Hunt

It has been a few weeks since I posted to the scavenger hunt.  Even though I don't feel like we really do that much around here, it always seems that Sunday sneaks up on me.

Tools

I found this old wheelbarrow at a condemned house one day.  I had driven by and seen it multiple times and finally made my husband stop and get it.  I knew that I wanted it to be a planter.  This photo was taken the day we put everything together.  The flowers are not as pretty anymore.  But for this day, they looked great!

Motion

 Near my town we have a "fun center" called Fast Lanes.  There they have bowling, indoor go-carts (electric ones so there are no fuel fumes), and an arcade.  We went there for the first time recently.  My daughter, who is 5, got to drive the go-carts by herself.  She is a driving fool.  She has her own go-cart at her grandparents house.  She also really likes bowling.  Yes she still uses the bumpers but she bowled for the entire hour that we had the lane.

Sweet

I did a photo shoot for a friend earlier this month.  This is her youngest son.  He is really a sweetie.  He laughed and smiled the whole shoot.  When he wasn't trying to eat my fuzzy blanket.  He had a crocheted monkey hat and bloomers complete with a tail for his photos.  He was a cute little monkey.

Dots

I didn't have any photos involving actual dots.  Then it occurred to me... Water droplets are dot shaped.  Tah-dah!  We got this hopscotch water sprinkler thingy at Family Dollar a few weeks ago.  It is actually pretty fun to play on.  You know Mom has to make sure all new things are "safe".  No matter where you step you are going to get shot in the eye with water.

Stripes

Enough said.

My Kindle, My Friend

If you read my blog, and lets face it no one does, you might know that I am doing a 30 by 30.  The explanation as to what this might be is listed on the page by the same name that can be found up at the top of this page next to home.  I just wanted to share with all of my readers (I snort at this, as I know that I don't have readers) that last week I began to read the Harry Potter books finally.  *Gasp*  I know.  I am a bit behind the times.  It doesn't bother me to not read a book right when it comes out just because everyone else is reading them.  To that I say: eh.  However, once I do begin to read a book series, I tend to do it quickly and with little thought to anything else.  Having explained that I will tell you that I have already finished the first 3 books in the week since I started.  I actually began Prisoner of Azkaban last night about 9:30 and finished it just a bit ago.

Hello.  My name is Christina and I am a nerd.  *support group applauds*

Time to start the next book...

Custom passport stamps

As you read in my previous post, my family is doing a weekly Parks Passport photo book this summer.  To give it more of a passport-y feel, I came up with the idea of designing my own stamps in photoshop.  I have only done the first two parks that we visited so far.

The first is Wilson Park.  I used a photo of the castle that they have at the park for the center.

The second is a park in our nearby town of Johnson.  The park itself does not have a name nor does it have any special feature to make it stand out.  However, the park is right next to the old post office so I made this stamp look like an actual stamp.

I found a tutorial on Youtube about making the stamps.  They are actually not that difficult and I just saved them as brushes in case I needed them again later.  

Hopefully I will remember to post a few update screenshots of the pages that I have done already in the next few days.

Parks Passport

While going through Pinterest looking for fun things to do with my daughter this summer, I discovered this gem.  We have visited two parks so far.  Every Friday is our park day.  Some of our parks are better than others and since the town we live in doesn't have very many parks I am including surrounding towns.  This is the original post that I found on Pinterest.  The photo will link back to the original blog not my Pinterest.

Summer park passport: make a map of all the parks in the area/after you visit the park, mark it on the map/note favorite features in the DIY book/take a picture next to park sign.

I have already began making the photobook that will go along with this project.  This is a screen shot of the cover.

I make all my photobooks using BookSmart.  I have three or four books that need to be printed and about six ongoing books.  I am thankful that I do have these books.  Earlier this year my computer crashed because my hard drive was thrashed!  I lost all the photos that I had taken in 2012 because like an idiot I had not backed them up on disks.  I was very thankful for the fact that I already had the 2012 book done so that at least I will have the memories in the book.  If I hadn't had the book I would have gone completely insane.  Any photo-moms out there can tell you that the photos are almost as special as the children themselves.  My husband was afraid when he called to tell me what had happened to my computer.  He had already arranged to sleep at his mother's house just in case I was so angry that I kicked him out.  He is the tech support guy in our house (and among everyone he knows... right now he is on the couch working on a laptop for someone from his work.) and he knows how I am with my photos.  It did not come to that since he was able to recover my books.  But alas, my photos are gone forever.

Moving on... I designed the cover to look like a real passport.  I am still undecided, but I think that it needs a crest in the middle.  Real U.S. passports have an eagle.  I don't think I want to copy a real passport but it needs something.  

I will post more screen shots as I start working through the book.

Happy creating!!

More Summer... Less TV

Today I decided something that seems like it should be obvious.  My daughter doesn't need to watch as much TV as she has been.  Obvious right?  I see her sitting watching cartoons and I wonder if she knows how to use her imagination.  I don't want her to miss out on developing the skills that foster creativity.  As a family we all watch too much.  Problem is, I always just get up in the morning and turn it on for background noise and get on the computer.  That isn't good either.

So I was on Pinterest... (no news there!)... and found a pin for screen free week:  100 kids activity ideas.  Now some of the ideas seem just a little silly to me and some are not doable for our family... but as there are 100 ideas we can surely find a few on the list that we can manage.