Bits and Bobs
I’m feeling a bit scatterbrained at the moment. Could be because its Friday afternoon - the end of a long week with a husband home in bed with a fever for 3 days, Guerita’s sleep-over camp and my general lack of focus for deciding on something to post about.
So, howsabout a Friday arvo round-up?
The sleep-over camp went very well. There was much excitement and only the slightest touch of nerves. Guerita informed me Lily (her teddy) was a bit nervous beforehand but that she was just excited. Apparently she went to sleep about 10pm, virtually the first in the class which was not at all surprising. The poor teacher looked very tired this morning. All in all a good experience for Guerita, although she has morphed into Miss Cranky-pants now. Early night I think!
It’s extremely frustrating having cooking and hot water powered solely by gas, that is stored in a tank on the roof. Inevitably you will run out of gas when:
- in the middle of cooking dinner/baking a sweet treat; and/or
- on a Friday afternoon.
We have lived in houses with external gas bottles before but there were always 2 bottles - a spare so you never got caught short. Here, there is no warning when it gets low or is empty, so dinner plans have changed as we wait for the gas truck to come and refill.
I was interested in your opinions on Old School vs New School Photography. One of the blogs I have been living at visiting regularly is The Pioneer Woman - specifically her photography section. She just released some actions for Photoshop which are basically a collection of steps that you might take to achieve the finished effect, bundled together to be activated with one click. They work a lot like a macro in MS Word. I love these actions - there are some gorgeous effects that are very easy to apply, so if you’re thinking you’d like to try out some photoshopping, these actions could be a good place to start. You don’t need to understand all the intricacies of Photoshop (just as well for me) but I find I am learning bits and pieces as I watch what the actions can do.
Ree (the Pioneer Woman herself) has started a Flickr group where you can upload your before and after shot and there are some fantastic photos and effects to see there. Its a great way to see what can be done with them. I even uploaded the before and after for my latest Wordless Wednesday photo, because I was pretty happy with the results.
The Pioneer Woman also has a guest blogger on photography, Miz Booshay, who posted today about the question on whether to touch up photos - and remove cookie crumbs from a photo of her daughter. Plus she gave great step by step instructions on how to do it if you’re interested.
Despite what feels like a long, tiring week, I have made some progress with getting myself organised. I might review some of the tools I’ve found recently to help with this in a separate post, but in a nutshell, I actually have lists (and have been able to cross things off them) and a bit of regular application to the everyday tasks means I’m feeling slightly more on top of things….for now.
I have managed to organise my email inbox somewhat to try and reduce the more then 1000 emails in there. The first and biggest step was to filter them so that the only emails in my inbox are from people I actually know. There’s less than 500 in there now, which is a good start but I still need to wade through all those old emails and delete, delete, delete.
I’ve also been tagged for 2 memes this week, which I intend to get onto very soon - a good way to keep posting until my brain can kick start some new blog topics….
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Looking forward to hearing how you are organising yourself
I am in the fling fling fling stage again as well as clean clean clean. I am exhausted but seeing the fruits of my labour thankfully!
Kelley’s last blog post..The biatch is going DOWN!
Glad the sleep over went well. My eldest is off to camp Monday morning which we are all pretty excitied about.
I will be excited to read your reviews of the organising tools. I love these type of things.
PlanningQueen’s last blog post..ANZAC Day - Talking About War With Children.
glad to hear the sleep over went well… hope the early night went just as well!
Congrats on the email - my google mail in box is crazy - I really need to spend some time deleting in there!
katef’s last blog post..Following a Blog Trail
I love your SOOC and after shot for PW’s flickr pool! The crop works so well and the colours look great. I am completely addicted! I actually need to get a grip, I can’t stop fiddling with photos, my husband and sister and child need me and yet here I sit, click, click, click!
I really really need to sit down and learn to use photoshop. I finally installed it, now I just actually got to learn to use it! hehe! I love the photo!
Glad the sleepover went went! I was fine sleeping away from home when I was little but my best friend couldn`t stand it and was still pretty bad at it in her early teens so it is better that they start a little early I think! (Although she hated even staying at her grandma`s etc etc also)
I have so much to still get organized before I move. It hasn`t really hit that I am leaving the country in just over three weeks not to mention moving next weekend! EEEEEK!
Look forward to both the meme`s!
ps: I nominated you for hottest mommy blogger at bloggers choice awards!
Lulu’s last blog post..N is for Nancy Drew…
Your blog looks great, you’ve changed it lately I think???
screamish’s last blog post..Me me me me me
Kelley - I saw the fruits of your labour on your blog - that was a massive clean up job!
Kel, PQ & Kate - I’m working on a post (or posts) now on those organising tools - there are lots out there and I seem to be trying them all (not very organised I know!)
Lulu - you should definitely have a go with photoshop - start with some actions and maybe some tutorials. It’s pretty daunting but I think the key is to understand layers - I’m going to scout out a beginner’s tutorial on that because I would like to read it and I think it’s be helpful to post for others wanting to get started.
And thank you SO MUCH for the nomination!!!!! I’m so chuffed! That is a very sweet thing to do - I’m off now to check out all the other great “Hottest Mommy Bloggers”. *snort*
Screamish - Thanks! But no major changes lately. I’m thinking about a new design soon, though - maybe when we’re back in Oz. New country, new theme, eh?
Glad the sleepover went well.
I’m flinging and reorgansing again too. Sigh. I don’t think it ever ends!
Bettina’s last blog post..Simple Pleasures Sunday
Glad to hear that you are getting organised. Hope your hubby is ok and that you are too. It’s not fun being a one man band when your other hak.
tiff’s last blog post..Monday moaning.
I am new school so I really like what you did in that second photo! I just did photos of a friend´s baby shower and I wasn´t pleased with how the pictures turned out so I messed with them a lot and turned them into sepia pics and blurred out the edges. I also cropped like mad because there were lots of empty cups and paper plates scattered about in the photos and it was a huge problem. The blurring helped with thais too. The reason I was so picky was because I made the pics into a video montage which was really nice. The hostess loved the video and I´m sure patted herself on the backfor such an elegant party but I´m not so sure she would have liked the original “messy” version, unedited with her paper plate messes!
I can´t wait to get my new camera this summer so that like you I can take better pictures of my kids!
misschris’s last blog post..Showers
[...] posted recently about wanting to get myself organised and about making some headway but the truth is I still have a LONG way to go. I guess its a never ending task because its not [...]
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