I thought I would try the old wedding ring in the book trick. How do you think I did?

I also got Miss E outside because we finally had some nice weather.
Blowing dandelions.

And just contemplating what she wanted to wish for before she blew all the seeds away.

I got some new shots of Miss E this weekend.

I asked her yesterday if she wanted to take pictures for valentine’s cards for her friends. She said “I will let you take my picture if you get out my guitar.” The only guitar I could think of is my blue guitar, so I retaliated with “but that’s my guitar.” She promptly let me know that wasn’t the one she was talking about. She says that there is one in the garage in her bench seat. “You just lift it up, Mom, and you’ll see my pink guitar.” Guess I’ll have to trudge through the garage to see if she knows her stuff.

ADSR4 has started. I teamed up again with Debbie!!! She’s such a great teammate.

The first challenge was an individual challenge where we had to scrap a picture, but tear it. I had a really hard time with this one. I couldn’t find a picture to tear. It just felt weird looking at pictures of DH & DD and thinking “How can I tear this?” I guess tearing a picture to me just has a negative feeling. So I decided to face my biggest fear and put myself in front of the camera. OK…I know this probably doesn’t count because it’s my eye only, but who wants to be skeered by the pudgy woman? Plus, do you know how difficult it is to get a good self portrait? OMG. Thenk goodness for the lovely invention of the DSLR otherwise I would have wasted 20 rolls of film. I would think that I had a good shot, and when I checked the camera I would be missing my head, or half my face (ok those were the early shots, but they were taken). So here’s what I ended up with.

Our second challenge was a collaboration. We had several requirements like 3 pictures, 4 papers, 2 fonts, 8 elements, a title and journaling. Debbie provided the pictures and journaling! Such a cutie!!! She scrambled through her bin of elements, and I trudged through my ream of papers (LOL) and here is our result.

I haven’t done much else with working on these LO’s. I was looking through pictures from Christmas and realized that part of our pictures didn’t download and I’ve formatted the memory card

We need to take a moment of silence and bid adieu to Mr. Mustachio. Over the break DH decided to grow a lil’ mustache. Yes, I am posting a picture and if he finds out I’m sure you will all be saying RIP to me. Of course this is Mr. Mustachio in the early days of vacation, so it’s not a 100% representation of his state before his demise. (And no, Mr. Scruffmuffin Way Past 5 O’clock Shadow did not continue rooming with Mr. Mustachio when we returned. For which I was eternally grateful, as Mr. Shadow is NOT my friend and does not have the cuteness appeal of Mr. M.) He was a little fuller, not by much, but definitely had more meat on his bones right before the unspeakable.

(please excuse the watermark as it’s not my normal one. it didn’t have one and i had to improvise without the proper font)

Why all this hooplah over a mustache? Just because I’m me. I thought it was cute. OK….adorable. He doesn’t grow it very often because he thinks it’s too sparse. I’m not a fan of the big bushies or the ones that look like push brooms under your nose. Soup filters….ugh.

Sooooo….if everyone would please join me for this one moment. **sigh**……………………………………………………………………………… ok. Thank you for sharing in my loss.

Have a superb day!

So today we got the first challenge for ADSR4. A LO with a torn picture. Not really my forte, but that’s what it’s all about isn’t it? Challenge!!! Bring it on, baby. OK…that was a little over-enthusiasm. I am definitely rusty on my scrapbooking. We had a prelim warm up assignment, and I was a little embarrassed. It looked so elementary to me, and compared to my stuff from a year ago it was a drastic regression. Saddens me a little, but it should also be motivation for me, I know. Let’s all look at the positive for me.

DD came back home today. I missed her so much. And then the attitude appeared. LOL…talk talk talk and not wanting to let adults talk. But eventually she changed it throughout the day. Papa got her a DS for Xmas and gave her $200 to go spend on games for it. The girl actually didn’t want to go shopping. Yes, you read that right! A GIRL not wanting to go SHOPPING. But of course her Nini and I dragged her out. Girl earned her Power Shopper badge. Brought home 9 games, spent every dime, and went to 3 different locations (twice to one). I must confess that I weaseled one choice for mom and dad into it (personal trainer cooking, but she likes cooking with us so it’s justifiable….right?). She and I played MillionHeir and I realized that the girl is smarter than me. Shhhhhhhh….don’t let her know that. I was definitely stumped at some of the puzzles and after a few minutes and screen scrolling she chimed in with the right answer. Makes me a little sad but proud at the same time. (I didn’t know that kindergarteners knew what tally marks were.)

DH was sick last night so I didn’t get to work on marketing items for the photo biz, or on marketing for our Valentine’s Special. (No….I’m not making excuses for procrastination…all of you married women or women in relationships know how men get when they’re sick. They want you to leave them alone, but they want to be all whiney and needy. It takes us to know what they really want. **sigh** Men…you can’t do much else but just love ‘em.) Working on those things will be my assignment this week along with work and ADSR4.

Well, I’m back at work today. But the good thing is that they are letting us go home early today. Yay!!! That will give me some time to work on the Valentine’s Day special I want to promote. I haven’t fully decided on what it will be yet, but I think it will be a % off of the session fee. I haven’t seen many other specials being talked about by other photogs, so I can’t compare.

Here it is the new year.

I’m at home with the furbabies. DD is at her PaPa’s and won’t be home for a few more days. DH went to work. What do I do when I’m home alone? Well…I updated the pricing on the website. I’m afraid it might be high, but in comparison to photographers in town it seems less. I don’t feel like I’m underselling myself, so I guess that’s a good thing.

What else do I do? Go back and sort through summertime pics to edit. Look what I found…

I thought this was so cute. I did a gradient map with a slight sepia tone. I duplicated the gradient map adjustment layer and masked part of it. I lowered the opacity on the original gradient map adjustment layer to allow for some selective coloring (or at least soft colors). What do you think???