Digital Layout 3
I’m learning a lot from Jessica Sprague’s Up and Runnning course. Her video tutorials are awesome. Easy to understand, and I love being able to see and listen at the same time. The best part is when the course is over, I’ll still have access to all the videos. I’m afraid I might need them so this is a great feature. This week we started using alphas and brushes–totally new to me. In addition, I’m using an older version of Photoshop Elements so everything doesn’t work quite the same way. Nonetheless, with the help of the message board, I finished this layout this morning.
Personal Assistant
Here’s today’s food for thought at A Fancy Word for Simple:
Your job is to focus on my personal happiness, she said, & I’ve got big plans, so break time is over.
—Brian Andres, Storypeople
I wonder–especially on Mondays–what it might be like to have a personal assistant. Someone whose job it would be do to all the things I don’t like about my life . . . What tasks would you assign to your personal assistant?
- Grading papers (but I’d be happy to look at the papers of kids who need extra help when the PA is done)
- Routine paperwork
- Paying bills
- Scheduling appointments (nearly impossible with an elementary school teacher’s schedule—which is why I do a lot of doctor/dentist appointments during the summer)
- Planning dinner
- Loading and unloading the dishwasher
I’m sure there are others but these come most immediately to mind.
Up and Running #2
I’ve caught up with one of my on-line courses. Here’s my second digital layout. I’m really getting into this!
Catching Up
The last week of school ate up all my time. I fell behind in my on-line courses and on the Her Space: My Space challenges. Here a few to catch up:
6-24
6-23
My Write-On Journal for Amy Sorenson’s journaling course on BPS.
6-21
6-20 Press: my great-grandmother’s iron. I use it as a weight for books/layouts while the adhesive dries.
6-15
Up and Running
I’m taking Jessica Sprague’s online digital scrapbooking course "Up and Running." I have her book Computer Tricks for Scrapbooking and I read her blog regularly so I was pretty sure I’d learn a lot in the course. I’ve completed my first digital layout (ever) and she made it really easy. Every day we get an email with more tips, kits to download, and midweek assignments. One more day with kids at school, three more days altogether, and then I can concentrate on the fun stuff. Here’s the first layout:
Boat
6-14-07 Her Space: My Space
Our boat just went in the water and into a much improved slip on the Genesee River which takes us out to Lake Ontario.
Hands
6-13-07 Her Space: My Space
Hands in my fifth grade classroom:
Tired
6-12-07 Her Space: My Space
21 report cards X 6 pages each=tired. Just 7 more days with kids. Ready for vacation.
Me
6-11-07 Her Space: My Space
Not a fan of self-portraits and I’ve never tried with my Rebel XT except in a mirror, but here I am in my space today:
Nugget
6-10-07 Her Space: My Space
The word of the day is nugget. Don’t know why it took me more than half the day to realize I had a the perfect response:
Yum!
Plugs
The photo of the day at Her Space: My Space is "plug." The photo is actually from the last trip we took. Here are both our iBooks plugged in the lamp at the Hampton Inn. I used to give Tracy so much grief about taking his computer everywhere we went, but now I am no better. Can’t imagine going for too many days without access to my computer. Don’t always need wireless, but there’s always something I want to do on my computer. Now that I have a new MacBook, it’s even more addicting.
A Brief Visit
Sarah drove 14 hours (round trip) for a 20 minute meeting with her Committe on the Preparation for Ministry. Since she and Adam have but one car now, she was here less than 24 hours. Nonetheless, we had a great meal at The Park Ave. Pub with her grandparents and some time for conversation. I took Thursday off and Sarah and I visited the Ansel Adam’s exhibition at The George Eastman House. It’s a wonderful exhibit with many photographs of the Rochester area which I don’t ever remember seeing plus many of Adam’s classics. Afterwards we wandered around the beautiful gardens and Sarah let me take a lot of photographs of her–generally she’s not so cooperative, but I certainly appreciated it. Here are a few of them:
Afterwards we did a little jewelry shopping and had a lovely lunch. Such a nice way to spend a day!
Cheese
6-8-07 Her Space: My Space
