Merry Christmas

Clipping Masks

Becky, from Lady Bug Designs has been busy.  She just put a new set of clipping masks into the store at the Digital Design Den.  They are called Over the Edge Clipping Masks and I love them.  I did a bit of work with them tonight.  First the preview, then my two pages.

This was done for a challenge at the Den.  It's a photo of one of my favorite Christmas ornaments.  I got this little angel for my first Christmas in my apartment 18 years ago.  I bring her out every year.  In addition to the clipping masks, I used the Christmas Memories kit also by Lady Bug Designs.

This page was done strictly for fun.  One of our neighbors left his flamingos out in the snow and I had to laugh, they looked so lost.  My photo was unremarkable, but I was able to extract the flamingos and add them to this photo from Flickr.  I used several of the clipping masks, and the kit, Frosty Flakes, also by Lady Bug Designs.

Frosty Flakes - New Kit from Lady Bug Designs

Becky, of Lady Bug Designs, has a new kit called Frosty Flakes.  It is a super kit, just perfect for all your snowy photos.  I had lots of fun with this one today.  You can get it at the Digital Design Den. 

Here is the preview:

And now for my pages:  The first one is of the bridge in Croghan Park.  It was taken last April during a snow storm that dropped five inches of the fluffy white stuff! 

This one was taken after an ice storm passed through.  The sun came out and everything sparkled.  Fortunately, the ice wasn't too thick and there was not much damage.

This one was taken on the Fernwood Trail in the Nature Realm.  Some people who had gone before had made a snow man.  The poor dear had seen better days.

Next one is a black swan that we saw on the Tow Path earlier this year.  He was a real beauty.  I've never seen one around here before.

And finally, a photo of me on the Tow Path along the Cuyahoga River last year.

Freebie Kit

I recently did a kit for a color challenge at Hummies World and thought I would post it here as well.  Hope you like it.  If you download, please leave a comment.  Thank you!

(Sorry, links expired)

Christmas Memories

Becky, of Lady Bug Designs, has a new kit out called Christmas Memories.  I'm not a fast scrapper, but I got four pages done last night.  I just couldn't stop!  It's a fantastic kit as you can see!

My first page - Getting the Christmas Tree:

template by Simply Yin

My second page - Merry Christmas

My third page - Chriskindl Market

template by Simply Yin

And my fourth page - Christmas Morning, circa 1969

Halloween Freebie

I recently did some challenges at the Digital Design Den and created some papers and elements for them.  They are just sitting on my hard drive gathering dust, so I thought I would share them with you.  If you like them and download them, please leave a comment.  Thank you!

Download   (Sorry, link expired)

Feeding the Chickadees

My son was here for a visit this past weekend.  One of the things we did was to visit the Nature Realm in the Metroparks to feed the chickadees and to hike.  Put a little birdseed in your hand, stand like a statue, and they will come.  They don't stay on your hand long either!  I must have take 20 - 30 shots and got a couple that are decent.  In the layout below I took the photo of the chickadee on my son's hand and DH took a photo of the gorgeous autumn colors reflected on the lake.  I used Lady Bug Designs kit, Family Matters to do the page.

New Kit from Lady Bug Designs

Becky has a new kit in the Digital Design Den store called Family Matters.  It's just perfect for vintage layouts and those old heritage type photos.

I've done two layouts so far and hope to get more done soon.  This one is my father's grandmother as a young girl.  It's the only photo I have of her.

And this one is my father's parents on their wedding day.  They both died when my Dad was a boy, so I never knew them.  The wedding license under the photo is their actual license.

Sunset

The sky was so pretty tonight - I grabbed my camera and took several shots.

Trains, Trains, Trains

I'm in the running to be on the CT team for Butterflies and Bluebells.  There's some stiff competition and I'm keeping my fingers crossed!  Her latest kit is Autumn Song available at the Digital Design Den.  It has lovely fall colors and elements.  I did these two pages with it.

There was only one chance to get photos of this engine and we were lucky to find a good spot. Photo by DH - my camera was accidentally left behind so I just got to enjoy the sounds and sight of steam.

There were actually two steam engines running on the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic RR this year - for several excursions over a two-week period. This is just one of the engines and we had a blast chasing them both up and down the valley for photos.

Click on the photos for a larger view.

Another Champagne and Chocolate Page

Just finished another heritage page using the gorgeous Champagne and Chocolate kit by Lady Bug Designs.  I'm finding this kit to work extremely well with these heritage photos.  The layout here features a photo of my DH's grandmother and friends taken way back in the early 1900's.

News!

I've just become a CT member for Lady Bug Designs.  WOW!  Exciting times for me.  Her first kit, Champagn and Chocolate will hit her store within in the next couple of days.  It is a lovely blend of creams, pinks, and browns - just perfect for vintage layouts, or anything else!

Here is the preview:

And here is my first layout:

 This is a photo of my mother probably taken sometime between 1935 and 1940.  People always say that I am her "spitting image" but I don't really see that much resemblance!  LOL

And this is the second one - one of the many picturesque trees at the Grand Canyon:

R is for Rain

I did this photo for a Flickr challenge.  There are two textures by Jerry Jones of Shadowhouse Creations and I used a clipping mask by Rita of Coffee Tea Photography.  It was actually raining at the time the photo was taken but it didn't show up very well so I found a tutorial on the web and and made a rainy overlay.  Isn't technology wonderful!!!

DDD Color Challenge

The Digital Design Den has a color challenge going for the month of August and I decided to give it a try.  Thank goodness for folks who are willing to share their talents - textures, patterns, styles, brushes.  I don't know what I would do without them.

 
This is the kit.  There are two files because I only have a free account at MediaFire and this way it doesn't take so long to download.  Hope you like it, and if you do download, a comment is much appreciated.

(Sorry, links expired)

The Beach

Way back in May DH and I went to the Headlands east of Cleveland.  I just finished a layout for the Digital Design Den with some photos from our trip there.   Yes, the Den is back and there are many happy people.  It is a great scrapbooking community and new members are welcome.

This is the layout using a template by Maggie May Designs.  I made all my backgrounds and elements and thought I would share them with you. 

And here is the kit I made for my layout:

If you like it you can download it   (Sorry, link expired)   

Smile - Today's Word

The word for today is smile.  This is the last post as the Creativity BootCamp is finished.  I've really enjoyed working with old photos and hopefully making them better.  I also did a couple of still life photos which I have never done before.  My "thing" now is using textures.  I love them.

For this last assignment I picked a photo of my son from years ago.  It was Christmas morning and he was opening his gifts.  I scanned it from a slide, put a hue/saturation adjustment layer to correct skin tones, a levels adjustment layer, and used two textures by Jerry Jones of Shadowhouse Creations.  The first one is translucent tone 9 at 100% and the second one is elemental grunge 5 at about 75% opacity. 

Smooth Sailing

Today's word is smooth.  I took this photo of a sailing ship in Cleveland when the tall ships visited several years ago.

I did some cropping, adjusted levels, and added a texture by Jerry Jones of Shadowhouse Creations.  Actually, I added the texture twice - the first time multiply at 60% and the second time soft light at 50%.

Since yesterday's photo for the word hush was not taken by me, only processed by me, I decided to add another photo, this one taken by me.

I used a texture by PareeErica.

Word for Today - Hush

The word for today is hush.  I thought of this photo taken when our grandson was only a year old.  Grandpa was reading to him when he fell asleep.  Then grandpa had to "rest his eyes" too!

The original photo was taken with a film camera by either my stepson or his wife - I scanned it into PSE, cropped it, did some dodging and burning, then added a texture by PareeErica.

Full Bodied - Today's word

My first thought was - wine!  It's always being described as full-bodied.  And what better wine than a good Cabernet paired with some fruit, cheese and pretzels.

I'm not totally happy with this photo, but it's too late to change it.  The subject matter has been devoured!

Drizzle

It was a very damp day with mist and drizzle when we visited Childs Park in the Poconos.  This is a photo of Fulmer Falls.  I did some burning and used a texture by PareeErica.

Today's word - Ornament

And I give you ornaments for the ears!

Fly - Great Blue Heron

Today's word is fly and this is my photo. 

Coffee - Break Fluid

The word for today is fluid and here is my interpretation.

Today's Word - Grow

The prompt for today is grow.  Couldn't resist the paraphase - all you Star Trek fans will understand.  This tulip has grown for three years.  It started as one bloom two years ago, and this year there were three.  And of course it was not in the flower bed, but in a pile of dirt that DH uses for fill when needed.  We never did figure out where the bulb came from.  Note to self:  dig those bulbs up and replant them in the flower bed!

Heavy Metal - The Portage Path

I've been going through old photos for these assignments.  Now that I have more experience with PSE, hopefully I can make them better.  Today's words were Heavy Metal and I did a scrapbook page.

Multilayered - The Grand Canyon

The word for today is multilayered.  The Grand Canyon has many layers plus I added three texture layers.  The photo was taken last December just before sunset.  The colors were gorgeous as the sun went down.

Texture 1 by Skeletal Mess
Texture 2  by Skeletal Mess
Texture 3 by Pareeerica

Today's word is Picnic

The Teddy Bear Picnic

If you go out in the woods today
You're sure of a big surprise.
If you go out in the woods today
You'd better go in disguise.
For every bear that ever there was
Will gather there for certain, because
Today's the day
The teddy bears have their picnic.

Background by rubyblossom
Texture by Pareeerica
Large teddy bear extracted from my photo.
Picnic teddy bears scanned from a book.
Remaining teddy bears by My Digital Things.

New computer!

After a frustrating couple of months, I've got a new computer.  I had problems starting in March and didn't have much use of it for three weeks.  After getting a new motherboard, power supply and hard drive, it worked - for about two weeks.  Then it died completely.  Fortunately it was still under warranty, so the company did a complete replacement.  Only problem - I had Windows XP on the old one, and now I have Windows 7 and PSE7 is not compatible.  Windows 7 does have a compatibility mode, but PSE 7 is still not functioning totally the way it should.  I'm holding out for the next version of PSE though, so I'll just grin and bear it until then!

Kimi's Creations pointed me to a new program called Creativity Boot Camp to help improve creativity.  I'm going to try it and see how it goes.  The prompt today was "ivory" and this is my interpretation.

 

New Kit

I just finished a small kit for Hummies April Design Challenge.  This was a bit of a challenge because the colors were a bit brighter than I usually use.  Hope you like it.  If you download, please leave a small thank you.  Your comments are very much appreciated. 


(Sorry, links expired)

Wow! It's been a long time since I posted anything. I've been busy working on photos from our December trip (still not done), then my computer crashed and one of the items replaced was my hard drive. It's been fun restoring everything. Thank goodness most of my files were backed up on Max, our external hard drive.

I took a break from the photos and did some playing and came up with two textures/overlays. Hope you like them. If you download, please leave a small thank you or a little smiley face. It means so much.

Download the textures        (Sorry, link expired) 

Black Swan

We took a walk along the Towpath Trail last week and came across this fella feeding in a small creek leading into the Cuyahoga River. He wasn't too cooperative about having his picture taken and with all the ice and snow, I couldn't get as close as I wanted.

This is the first photo I've ever edited using RAW in Photoshop Elements and I really like it. I never knew you could open a jpeg image as a RAW image. The things you learn when you browse through photo books at the local bookstore! When I was all finished editing, I used a texture by Pareeerica and posted it in my Flickr photostream. The link to the texture is there.

More Backgrounds

Still playing with patterns and blending modes and came up with these backgrounds. They are letter sized rather than 12 x 12. Hope you find them useful.

Sorry, link expired.