Friday, April 29, 2011

Aristocats, take one

We just got back from the first show with Rachel in the main role of Duchess. It was so cute. The kids worked so hard for this, months of play practice after school every single day. It really paid off, the show was so cute! They all did a nice job, little mistakes and accidents here and there, but hey, stuff happens, right? I went to the rehearsal yesterday and got a few halfway decent shots. The light was still pretty awful, but better than during the performance




It's so cute, The young man who plays Rachel's counterpart is actually a friend of Michael, he is in his class, he is a big boy. The mouse was a riot, she has this really squeaky voice, too cute! Below is Rachel's best friend, one of her kittens. Anyway, it was cute and fun and tomorrow they have another performance. I'll be glad when it all is over though, maybe things will normalize a little more again.

I did a photo shoot the other day. Two cute little ones I did for Christmas. I am not quite done editing yet, but I think the pictures are coming out really nice







Aren't they just adorable? I just got this new background, I totally love it!!! The colors go with so many different things.

As for pages, I didn't get a whole lot done. Today I finally updated my 365 pages



I am so keeping these simple. So what if people don't care for them too much, they are keeping a record and they don't take too much time, so I won't lose interest :)



As you can see, I am putting Rachel's photo shoot photos to good use :) I really like how they turned out, fun, fun. Now I need to work on Gabby's photos, I still haven't finished them. This stuff takes a lot of time!

Well, I am beat, it's been a long day!




Tuesday, April 26, 2011

From snow to the middle of summer in one week

that's what it feels like around here. It was so hot and sticky, it felt like July yesterday and today. Gabrielle got burned just going for a walk yesterday and her friend was really red! What a crazy weather pattern. I can't complain of course, I love the warm weather!
I have been running. Day before yesterday I went around the park twice and today I ran 2 miles on the treadmill in under 26 minutes. I was so proud of myself LOL. It does feel good and it only takes about an hour to run, do some weights and shoot some hoops with Gabrielle. It was fun and great exercise. I might just take a liking to running after all these years of saying that I could never do it :)
Easter was nice, a lot of singing and long masses. The weather wasn't too bad, the kids still did an egg hunt. At first I thought Michael wasn't interested anymore, but then he rolled out of bed after all.




The pictures aren't the best, but they do the job :)

I took some pictures of Rachel yesterday. She actually asked me for them and I was more than happy to oblige. The best part is that she is actually happy with the ones I edited so far. That means a lot, she is very critical of pictures of herself







That was really fun!
This afternoon we had a lot of thunderstorms and heavy downpours. It was hot and sticky all day though, we had to kind of expect that to happen. Hey, I take anything, as long as it isn't snow.

I took pictures of Gabrielle and her friend the other day, but I didn't get them done yet (except for the two I showed earlier). They will be posted next time. Oh yeah, pages...





Well, time to go to bed again, the days just fly by...


Saturday, April 23, 2011

new cut

my hair, that is! A lot of people on FB asked for a photo, so I decided to post one here too. It's an awful Iphone photo, but you get the picture (so to speak :))


of course it was blustery and rainy all day, so as soon as I stepped out, all the loveliness of her artwork disappeared and I was left with a stringy mess. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted. It's a different red, a little darker and more purplish. I hope everybody is satisfied now :)
It's still cold and rainy around here, it doesn't even feel like EAster. Every year my poor magnolia blooms, we get this lousy weather, so that the flowers turn to mush and lie on the ground to rot. It's a real shame.
Well, today is going to be a busy day, with preparing for tomorrow and mass tonight. Gabby and I bought some more candy yesterday, so I can get the baskets ready today. I supposed you all are in the same boat as me. At least no mass this morning...
We stopped at Panera's again yesterday, I had tuna (since it was Friday), it was good!
A couple of pages



The top one was made following a new tutorial by Cassie Jones. Pretty cool, there are some things in there I didn't know, just little shortcuts, that are pretty awesome. The shaping was done with my tablet, freehand. That was something else. I have never been good at drawing and that wasn't much better. It took me several tries LOL. Fun putting the paper on it though, it's not a clipping mask.....
As always, you can find all the supplies at designerdigitals.com 
The other day Gabrielle asked me to take some pictures of her and Catie while she was here. She said they didn't have any for FB. WE had a good old time, the two of them are good posers LOL. Then Rachel took over since I had to finish dinner and she actually got some great shots of them jumping. I was impressed! (of course I had already dialed in all the settings) She is very artistic, I think she would do great with photography, she has a good eye! Here is one I took and worked on


I put them on a different background....

Here is Rachel's, isn't it cool? There is a little motion blur, but I just love it!


Okay, gotta run and make some breakfast! Have a wonderful Easter if I don't have a chance to post before then!


Wednesday, April 20, 2011

yard sale and more

Every year the 8th graders organize a yard sale in order to finance their final class trip. We all had to help set up the donations that kept coming in and Saturday was the sale. It was crazy busy, thank goodness and the kids did pretty well. Amazing what people will buy! The kids came up with this fun idea for a photo, I loved it!


I whitened out the faces.... aren't they just too funny? They really must have been tired after all that work and packing everything back up at the end.

Sunday we decided on a whim to drive an hour to go to a different mall. They have a large bookstore and nice shops we don't have around here, so it was fun for everybody. We wound up at the Golden Corral for dinner, I always like it there, something for everybody

Today we got the sad news that the youngest daughter of friends' of ours passed away after a 3 week long battle with an infection in her lungs. Nobody was able to find out what really was wrong with her and the infection never went away. The poor thing and the poor family went through so much these past weeks, but I always thought she would make it until a couple of days ago. I just feel so so bad for them.  There were so many of us praying for her, now we have to pray for the family, it's going to be so hard for them, now that the battle is over...

I just finished editing the last photos I took last week. Now we just need some nice weather so that we can do the outdoor photos and be done with the whole thing. I'm supposed to take some spring photos next, it will probably be after Easter at this point. We'll see.

I am all caught up with the 365 pages again, I figured this way I'll have the rest of the week to play and make fun pages :)







the photo below is of this guy we saw in the Mall. There was a whole group of people dressed in funky clothes and he was gracious enough to let me take his picture.


I started running! I have never been a runner, last week I ran for the first time around the park. I actually made it a whole time around. Then a few days ago I ran a mile on the treadmill at the gym and this morning I made it around the park 1 1/2 times. It's still pretty hard, but I know I can do it. I guess every time it will get a little bit easier (I hope)

Well, time to get the kids to bed, it's getting late again....

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Late movie and more

Remember that movie I told you we were going to see? Turns out we missed all the earlier ones, so the girls and I decided to go late. I took them to the 9.30 showing of Hanna. It was quite the experience for them. It was strange to get out this late and have all the streets empty. They enjoyed the bit of "adulthood", but they were giggling about the guys seated behind us making all kind of off-colored remarks during the movie. It totally escaped me :) It was an interesting movie, a little too violent for my taste but what isn't today....
I did the senior shoot, it really was fun. She is such a good model and so dang pretty. I posted some on FB as you can see on the side, I have a few more (actually a ton more, as I gave her a b/w version for each of them and did some crops and different backgrounds....)





these are just a few. She is coming back tomorrow for some more studio shots with her track uniform. Fun, fun. I can't wait for the weather to get better, so we can do the outside shots. These photos are mostly for Mom, she wanted pictures of her looking at the camera, so we got tons of those :) Now I am putting all the photos into the proofing gallery so she can look at them in peace.

I haven't created much in the way of pages, I think there was only one, let me see...


all supplies from designerdigitals.com
Yup, that's it. I have been too busy editing photos and setting up google stuff.

The weather around here is back to chilly and rainy. We get one day that's like summer and then back to this! Argh! That's why I felt like doing the above page, my flowers inspired me. I can't believe they actually bloom right now. It can only get better!

I have been having trouble with one of my teeth, it was throbbing for days and I finally called for an appointment to get a root canal that I had put off months ago. They can't see me until May 5th! In the meantime I started taking Amoxicillin and this morning it actually feels better. yesterday was the pits!!!! It hurt so bad and nothing even touched the pain! I took 800mg of motrin and still nothing. I even swished brandy around in my mouth and it did nothing. I am sooo glad it's better today LOL. Toothaches are the worst!

Well, let me get back to getting those pictures ready for her, I have some other ones I need to edit yet also...

Saturday, April 9, 2011

It can't be

9 days since my last post?? Where does the time go, yikes! I couldn't even tell you that a lot of things have been going on, just the same routine every day. We started going to a local fitness hall to walk on the treadmill and do some weights, so that was good. I haven't been to Karate in 2 weeks, not good.
I have been buying some cute spring props for the studio, I can't wait to use them!
I'm supposed to do some senior studio shots this afternoon, she didn't get back to me yet, so we'll see. Planning a movie for later tonight and maybe Altoona for tomorrow. Haven't seen our friends for ages. Everybody is so busy all the time and we live vicariously through the kids :)
I found the coolest site. It's a webcam on an eagle's nest. I have been watching the eggs being hatched and now it's so cute to see the little ones being fed (as long as you can ignore what they are eating) At this point they are cute and fluffy. Here is a link if you want to watch them.
I have been busy in the pages front. I am finally caught up with the 365 pages
I know it's kind of small this way, but I like the effect better when you can see both pages next to each other.
Here is the rest of the pages I did






As always, all supplies are from designerdigitals.com

I love the photo in the last page, it's one of Rachel's self-portraits. I don't know how she does it just using her phone in front of a window. She blows out all the highlights, but it looks really good on her! I really like the effect with the rest of the page, it kind of goes together, don't you think. I love the page above that too, it brings back so many memories. They were so happy and proud to be holding those birds. That was several years ago in Cancun.
As you can see we had snow again on April 1st. I really really hope to be done with it now, I need sunshine!!!
Well, I need to clean up the studio a bit so that it's ready for my senior!
Have a wonderful weekend!

Never say Never!

Well, here I am creating my very own blog! I was always very sure I would never get into this blogging "thing", but here I am. I hope you will enjoy finding out a little about my not so interesting life!