A View of Lisa's World

one of those nights...

when I just have nothing to say....or more to the point, I don't have the energy to come up with something to say. I'm pooped. I hate to cop out...but it is just one of those nights. sorry.

not much

to blog about tonight! Today my boy and I just hung around the house. I got some work done, including a fun album for my class. We had a wonderful day together. At one point I worked on one table of my office and he worked on a project on the other and I was taken with just how nice it was...just me and my boy hanging out.

Tomorrow more of the same is on tap. There are only a few weeks of summer left and this is the first week that we really haven't had much planned. It is kind of nice. In just 4 short weeks my boy will be a Kindergartner....Tuesday afternoon Wii tournaments and side by side creating will be a thing of the past.

Gee...when I put it like that it makes me kind of sad.

Monday Recap....

A few things to report today....

First, as I was watching the news this morning the traffic girl took her John Madden pen and drew a big circle with an x in it for the main road in and out of our town. Apparently a truck turned over and the road was going to be closed for several hours. This put a cramp in our Monday errand and swim lessons plan.

So we got a late start, but all was going pretty well when I realized I had left the dang swim bag on the kitchen table. Todd has been taking swim lessons for about 14 months and as of this morning he had just 2 lessons left...and with 2 lessons left I went and forgot the flipping bag for the very first time.

This particular errand Monday didn't include Target, which is rare, but once I realized we had forgotten the bag we had to do a Supermarket sweep through there for trunks, goggles and a towel. I really should have taken a photo...it is a total record that I got out of there in less than 10 minutes with 3 items and only $20 less in my pocket.

Crazy stuff....

I did manage to remember my camera and get some swim photos....

The dang goggles we grabbed didn't work out, so he ended up using the teacher's anyway. He had a good lesson though, and I did manage to get a few shots. As he finishes out these 14 months he's gone from not putting his face in the water to mastering freestyle, diving and the breaststroke. Cool!

In other news, Product Playground 2:The Albums is now open for registration as well. This class will begin the week after Product Playground TWO (the layouts) finishes. If you sign up for the layout class, you get a coupon for a discount on the album class (and you get to hang out with me for 12 whole weeks!) Any questions, just let me know!

I love my brother

and it is a really good thing that I do.

First, he came home from their little get away to Cabelas with several things that shoot...and with caps no less. So my ears are ringing and my house smells like gun powder!

Then I find out that last night at an event he went to, he wanted to buy me a dog! A dog! Hello? I love that boy but he is killing me.

His nephew however thinks he is the bomb.

Do you know why they call it bald?

Today at lunch, all of a sudden Todd pipes up with this story for my Dad (who just happens to be bald).

Hey Papa

I know why they call it bald.....

because when your head has no hair on it, it looks like a ball...

get it? ball? bald?

Playing it old school-part 2

So, time to bring back some more old school Product Playground ONE!

Week 2 of the original class was Photo Corners and Frames! Remember when photo corners were everywhere in every color and pattern and when ready made frames were really popular?

I do and I still have some...and I still love em.

 

I came up with the following P-L-A-Y ideas.

P= Point it out!
Arrows were also big back in 06 so I figured a line of photo corners would make a quick and easy arrow to point to a special photo or journaling. In my layout, I wanted to indicate the difference between the “before” and “after” of a specific date…so I created a path of photo corner arrows to tell my story. 

L=Lifts and flaps

Photo corners are an easy addition to tags or hidden journaling and make excellent “handles” for lifting or pulling interactive elements on a page. Pre-made frames are excellent to showcase one photo, while lifting up to reveal more photos underneath.

This layout was also my sketch for the week...

A= Alter a frame to match your design!
I love that frames can easily be cut and turned into large photo corners, and photo corners can be combined to make a frame. In this example, I cut acetate frames and sewed them over patterned paper

This is still one of my all-time favorite layouts.

Y= You can also....and for this week, my "you can also's" were...

• Cut the backing portion off of the photo corners and line them up for an interesting border.

• Frame a pre-made sentiment with decorative photo corners. 
  

• Rub on or stamp a sentiment onto a metal frame, then frame a rub-on image to make a simple card.  Framing photos and rubber stamped images works well too!

So there you have some more old school Product Playground. Links to the new classes are on the right!

mysteries and sleepovers....

So we are having a sleepover over here. Alex is here and he has been a perfect house guest. Todd and Alex went to bed at 9pm...two little gigglers, having a sleepover. After many false alarms of silence where we thought they were snoring, there would be another burst of giggles...but pretty soon they were out. Two perfect angels. I wanted to get a photo, but I was afraid to flash them awake, so you will have to take my word for it. Cute.

Today after we dropped Alex at school we decided to check out the Winchester Mystery House. We drive by often enough, and Todd has been wanting to know what it was. It was an ok tour...not sure it was worth $50 but Todd thought it was cool.

Taking photos was really tough because the lighting was crazy and different in every room. Plus every time I put the camera up, one of our tour mates walked in front of me. Here are a few I managed to get.

We spent a few minutes in the gardens and grabbed a couple of shots in front of the fruit packing shed and the stables...but Todd wanted lunch, so his facial expressions were less than stellar!

I finally got a fakie smile....just to shut me up I think.

I loved some of the house architecture, so I tried to grab some interesting shots when I could.

I loved this wallpaper stuff that was on a lot of the walls...it was definitely paper of some sort, but it felt like plaster....so beautiful.

Remarkably, Todd really listened to the tour guide. He was excellent on the 65 minute, 1 mile and God knows how many steps and windows tour.

I grabbed a few shots of him on the tour when I could....

Something is wonky with my typepad, and my photos...but I think you get the idea.

One other thing on the subject of photos...the one Big Picture/Shutterfly photography class of mine that is open right now for is FREE....so if you've thought about checking things out there, this is a good time to try it. Leave me a comment and let me know what you think!

 

New do's and stories...

Today was new do day...I had a hair appointment, and was just planning on my usual cut, but after seeing Moriah's great new color, and after seeing my 2 year old highlights that were on the bottom of my hair, glowing orange in the morning sun, I decided maybe a little color was in order.

Now, lets go back in time shall we?

Haircolor and I haven't always gotten along in the past. The glowing orange highlights were the leftovers from that sad day linked above. I vowed that if I was ever going to do color again it would have to be the expensive way. So today I got the orange colored out, and some new highlights (subtle) put in. I think this is a pretty big improvement from last time.

While I was off taking Alex to and from school and getting my hair done, my boy was getting a cut of his own from my mom. He has the cutest little buzz cut and I love it.

Here we are....

Truth is, there were photos that showed our hairdos a bit better than this one, but this was the one with the true smiles...and it made me happy. I'm loving that photo-booth thing on my Mac. So fun.

I even accidentally got a shot of myself that is technically not that great, but for some reason I really like it...I think it is because I look at it and see a story that has to be told and I am making some plans for it on a scrapbook page coming your way soon.

My BIG News!!

So a while ago I mentioned that I was working on some new things for Big Picture. This is in addition to the Product Playground 2 and the Albums class...and I've been dying for it to get announced.

I'm sure there will be a more formal announcement from people in higher places than me, but I happened to click on the website a few minutes ago and there it was, so I guess it is ok for me to blog about it. I have to say I danced a little jig when I saw it there!

So drumroll...

Big Picture and Shutterfly are teaming up to bring new and exciting online education featuring digital scrapbooking, photobooking...and here is where I come in...digital photography!

There is a new "digital studio" on the BPS site that you can check out here. I am the instructor for the 3 digital photography classes that are listed, and I have to say I am just SO excited.

I'll share more about my specific classes in the next couple of days, and of course if there are any questions about them you can let me know!

Monday Monday....

Mondays are my errand days, Target, Swimming lessons and the grocery store. It is all well and good, but sometimes at the end of a Monday it feels like it has been a really long day...with all of the loading and unloading and putting away Bah!

So I guess that is the long way of saying I'm tired tonight.

In just a few Mondays it is all going to change anyway. Swimming is almost over, and Kindergarten is not that many Mondays away. Sigh.