Life In Color

Erin I found them!

I have been looking for these photos. I knew I had some of Erin and I batiking in high school.

and

I know, I know. I guess I thought the huge sweatshirt was cool. And Erin was right in asking, "how did we walk away with any non-stained clothes?"

Those pictures were not in this pile:

I thought that was all the pictures in my big order I had placed to shutterfly, but I was wrong, the rest came today.

Whoa. I really like the quality, the only real beef I have is that for some reason the pictures end up all out of order in the little envelops. I'm thinking they have multiple printers working or something and then just stuff what ever comes out first, but it does take a little sorting to get it all worked out. I have filed away 2003-2005 (it took 8 albums, due in large part to the three for our 2004 USA road trip), and piles for 2nd quarter 2006, 2007, and the wedding. I ran out of photo albums to file it all away. Meanwhile I've started pulling photos for the category drawers (see Stacy's book Photo Freedom). It's really doing that, and finding all the differnt photos of say, me and my brother, or pictures of my feet over the years.

If you can't find me I'll be under piles of pictures! :)

Bust a Bucket

Tonight Bj and I headed to a concert in Portland with Brian and Melissa. It was awesome, Jose Gonzalez, you rock! Jose is a Swedish singer-songwriter. You might know one of his songs from that awesome Sony Bravia commercial. He sang all my favorites, including Down the Line. His voice is so yummy.

On the way up there we were talking about lots of random things, as if often the case. Somehow we got onto the subject of the Blazers (our professional basket ball team). And I brought up Bust a Bucket. I keep bringing this up because I want someone else to go, "oh ya, I remember that." But I haven't gotten a lot of response. See back in 1992 the Blazers were white hot, they ended up winning the Western part of the playoffs (I know nothing of the structure of basketball playoffs, nor the game really). It was the coolest thing in school to talk about the blazers, wear something related to the blazers, or try and sing the chorus of Bust a Bucket, a song hey made with a local radio station. Well Brian said he did know it, and then Bj said, "Oh Luke can sing that." So we called him, and he did, and he told me it was on YouTube. And now I've just had one of the best flash backs ever. Check it out

Any other fans out there?

What I remember: getting up early with my dad to stand in line at Fred Meyer's for Blazer's Western Conference winner T-Shirts so I could wear one to school. My little AM/FM radio that had a tape player and this single was in there a lot that spring. Staying up late to watch a game on TV. Watching my dad do his winner's hand rub thing (he rubs his hands together when he's really excited about something). Never being able to say: "Bust a Bucket who'd a dunk it Blazer duty Super sunk it Slamn' Geez it Killer Three's it go up get got it good" My favorite part was, "It was rip city show time, fully fantastic, positively Portland, slam bombastic!"

Okay that was fun. :)

Gains and Losses

Today was my exact two week mark on my diet. I'm happy to report that I've lost a total of 8 pounds, or about a pound a week. I'm not happy to report that this would have been more but when ever Aunt Flo comes to visit she makes me eat like a friggin banshee. What is that about? This is what goes on in my head days before my monthly; "eat, eat, eat, eat, eat, ohhh have some more." I don't get it. The other day I wolfed down two chocolate bunnies. People I don't even like chocolate bunnies. Grrr.   And I'm beginning to think I might have to start supplementing the calorie counting with (gasp) working out. I know, I know. I don't want to do it, but something is happening with me. I don't believe those calorie calculators. The ones that tell you how much you can have to stay the same weight. When I fill in all my info (and of course mark my lifestyle as sedentary) it tells me I can have 1,600 a day to stay the same. They are such liars. I have a 1,500 day a couple times a week (1,200ish is what I shoot for) and I've gained back a pound. Well anyway enough about that, I did start taking fish oil tablets and the first few weeks I felt like they were a miracle pill, but I think my body's adjusted. Oh and also it's hard to eat right when your husband makes you a tuna melt... WITH A WHOLE CAN OF TUNA (who does that? I have never seen that done). I said, "damn hon, with the bread and everything this is going to have a ton of calories." He said, "oh and that's not counting all the butter I used." Oh but it was so good though. Mmmmm. So that's me checking in, 2 months down, 2 to go. Watch out for me in June, I'll be the one in the bikini (laying in my backyard where no one can see my incredible whiteness).

So now, let's talk about the gains. Oh, you know where I'm going with this, thrifty goodness baby! First of all I forgot to tell you that I went to an estate sale on Saturday before we started dying. It was across the street. There is no way I can not go to an estate sale across the street from anything (baby shower, lunch date, visiting a long lost relative, whatever). It was totally cleaned out because it was the second day. But the prices were good and everything under $35 was half off. So look what I got for five bucks:

Some of you might remember that I have one of these that looks very similar. But listen that was a crazy model. It had a slot for a 3.5" floppy disc, and way too many functions for me. I like simple. My friends I think I've finally found the perfect electronic typewriter: GX-6750. OH MY GOD looking up that link for you I see that they are not even an old model. They still make them, retail: $119.99 . Oh man getting deal like this makes me feel so awesome. Especially when they come with this:

Come on, two refill cartridges and a corrective tape? They were practically giving this away. Well this and the two callanetics videos (circia 1986 and 1992 - it's a gentle workout!) I got, too bad VHS players have gone the way of the dinosaur. I wonder if Bj would like me to hook one up to his high tech system. Oh man I'm cracking myself up over here. I have got to scan in the covers of these videos, classic high cut leotards. LOLOLOL.

So that was my first sale of the season. But I'm not going to call it official, since it was an accident, and I had to borrow three bucks because I was unprepared. Anyway I'm going to look at the paper Thursday and see if there is any reason to get up early Friday.

Did you know it's spring break here in Oregon, or at least the valley. It's true we like to have vacations during our worst possible weather. Floods of 1996 anyone? My brother took a little boat down and was floating on the golf course. It was like one giant lake. Good times. Well Michele has her nephew and I told them about the Tulip Festival (Bj and I went a couple years ago). So they decided to head down and I met them there at ten a.m. It was nice:

We can all handle the weather of course, but apparently the tulips can't and the only blooming were safe under tents. I bought some blooms, ate a sausage and headed to the goodwill nearby. Where I totally scored. I got lots of cool ledger paper. I think someone brought in stuff from a going out of business office supply store or something. Then I was picking around and saw this bag:

I never have good luck with getting used stamps (except off eBay) because they are usually just teddy bears. Nothing against teddy bears, but... I started pocking around the bag a little more. It was 9.99 (which is like a hundred bucks in Goodwill land) so I had to really look at it. And check out what I found, they are teacher's stamps!

27 differnt actions, including my favorite:

That's right, knitting. Also has random things like drumming, pushing, waving, pointing. I am in love with them. There were 10 modes of transport in there as well (including a hover-craft, LOL), and three random stamps: a teapot, kettle, and tap. Making me think that Goodwill split up a bigger set.

So this made me just about giddy, coupled with some other things which I'll explain below. Plus I'm still coming off the high of being on the juice (two diet cokes in one day yesterday, bad Amber, but I really get stuff done :). So I felt like today needed to be immortalized. I made a two page layout, "happy today" in like an hour, but I don't feel like the two pages have to be shown next to each other (read I can't seem to get a good picture of them like that). So page one:

The 11 things making me happy. KI Memories accents, new paper, fabric, random paper and flowers. I used my fountain pen so I'll type it out for you:

1.Someone left 1:13 worth of change in the meter at the library.
2. Pulling onto a busy street someone let me in.
3. Driving to the tulip fields, seeing Brett, Michele, and Violet. Eating sausage.
4.Awesome stamps: 27 actions, 10 modes of transport, 3 extras
5. this cool paper for 99 cents a pack
6.the $5 typewriter w/ extra ribbons & corrective tape!
7. 8 pounds lost in 2 months today.
8. Oregon weather - the rain, hail, and bursts of light.
9. new ribbon - getting lots done in Ribbon Jar land.
10. Finally found the song, "tears and Laughter" from Bones.
11. Being Alive.

Page two:

The today thing was an accident, I punched the letters out to close together with my quickutz, so I decided to use the negative image. The top right picture is a paper sample from Sciarrino, a perpetual calendar. All the pictures I took today, love my mini printer (old picturemate, 2005). Super quick flower with new silk. Expect to see a lot of these. I love making ribbon flowers like this! So there you have it. A good happy day. And I hope yours was even better.

p.s. yes, the layout is straight in real life. :)

Ribbons and Pictures, Lots and Lots

Yesterday I ordered 1,860 4x6 photos and 40 5x7 photos. Oh my god! I still have six quarters to work my way through: the current one, last two of 2007, and three of 2006. Those six are going to have even more photos than the tiny amount of digital photos I took from 2003-early 2006. It is so funny looking back through them all, it goes film, digital pre-blog, digital blog with Bj's camera/my point and shoot, digital blog with my D50 (2006 and on). Let's just say I really up-ed my game. I've stopped sorting for now because I thought that all my photos for 2003 and 2004 were film, I didn't realize I had some digital photos I took with Bj's so now I have to re-organize some of the binders I've done already. Anyway I did file away the first quarter of 2007 (that was my test to see the quality of Shutterfly). I brought that over to grandpa today to visit. We looked through it and I yelled out the descriptions of everything (get a hearing aid PLEASE!). At the end of the binder he looked and me and said, "you sure do take pictures of everything, don't you?" Yes, I do. :) Including this loveliness:

Some Hanah Silk I just got for Ribbon Jar. Lord, I have never wanted to eat my ribbon so badly. Seriously this stuff is delisios. And no, I can't link to it... yet. I have a huge backlog of new wonderful ribbons to add to my store. See it turns out that I have no problem ordering them, but getting them up on the site... AHHHHHHHHHHHH I hate it. I really do, it's my least favorite Ribbon Jar thing. Oh that and answering email questions like, "I don't understand your site, do you sell by the yard?" It's listed as price per yard, so this question always gets me. Anyway I have about two hundred new ribbons to add. They are all so great. I have a bunch of new suppliers. I had to start finding some more local (American) mills because the dollar is so low. It's worked out great because I get to carry hand-dyed beauties like these now. I have been updating my new page, so check it out. I also added a few new categories and re-organized things a bit under shop ribbon. For now I'll leave you with one more picture:

The sample cards, all stacked up. Me running my hands through them. It was that or rubbing them against my face. So soft. Expect to see me wearing a silk flower pin like everyday of the week soon.

The what I've been up to post

This was sort of a long weekend for me. On Thursday evening my mom and I spent the night in Portland after doing a drop off at the airport. It was so much fun to hang out with my mom. We ate Jelly Bellys in bed, and gabbed mostly. On Friday we did a little bit of shopping and had lunch with my grandma, aunt, my mom's mother in law, and Kat and her mom. So fun.

I'm trying to take more pictures with my mom, and other people that I see like ever day or week, but don't seem to have nearly enough pictures of. I don't know why that is, but my new picture filing/organizing system is sure pointing it out to me!

On Saturday I headed down to Corvallis to meet with an old friend, Erin. Her and I took a lot of the same classes in high school, including what I think was called "new mixed media". In that class we did batik, shibori, and other fabric dying techniques. Erin has been wanting to get back into dying fabric, and I was game, so we set up at a friend of hers.

Basically you dye fabric:

Rinse out the dye, dry it, and then layer on an application of wax over that. Anything you've covered with wax will stay that color the next time you dye.

Here you see Erin putting on the wax with one of the traditional tools. That fabric is actually a light yellow, so if she dyes it say, blue next time the rings will be light yellow, and the background will be a little bit green from the yellow. Well that's how it's supposed to work in theory. In reality it can be a little hard to get it all coordinated, and then do the proper amount of waiting (hmm maybe that's only hard for me!). The step after all the dying and waxing is the hardest: getting the damn wax out. I tried the boiling method and ended up with a scuzzy wax covered piece. I have another to do so I'll use the iron method I learned in high school: putting the piece between two layers of newsprint and ironing the wax out. I hope this makes the fabric soft enough to use for some kind of sewing project. We'll see.

I meant to get to that yesterday, but got stuck in the sorting/editing/uploading my pictures loop I've been in for a week. I have THOUSANDS of digital photos to go through. Luckily I only have six more quarters to do. I sort out my favorites from each quarter (and at the same time actually delete some of the terrible ones), then edit those and upload them to Shutterfly. It makes our internet so slow, so I'm trying to do it all on weekends and evenings when I don't need to use the internet to work.  I also ordered more photo albums, I'll have a picture soon of my progress, I'm quite proud of it, actually. Although the 2,000+ pictures I have left to print is going to cost me a pretty penny. Yikes!

Oh good time for a few questions. I got these nifty label holders from See Jane Work a few years ago, and now I can't find them anywhere, any one know where to get them?

Second question, any one used the cloth D-ring American Crafts albums? I want to pick up a bunch for my new library of memories system, but have never seen them in person. I know the modern kind are really popular, but I don't think that will mesh with what I have, I want to just get black to go with all my other albums. Would the label holders even fit on the spine (they hang down about 2 1/4" on the inside - but the wires are on the edges, not down the middle)?  And if you are in the valley does anyone actually sell these around here. This is the best deal I found (but would still have to pay shipping). Thanks ladies!

The Big Picture

So I said it before, but I'm taking a Big Picture Scrapbooking class, Stacy's Library of Memories. It's more of an organizing class than an actual scrapbooking class, but you have to organize your photos to scrapbook (I'm realizing). So it's brought me face to face with my digital photo mess. Not really a mess, but just more the overwhelming amount. I've decided to organize as Stacy says, with favorites folders by quarter.

I have only two quarter's done so far. If you want to see how her class works, and don't want to wait until her next class (next year) I really recommend her new book: Photo Freedom. So good. Anyway as part of this process I'm going through and printing these quarterly photos. It's adding up to a lot of photos, as you can see. My first order should be coming from Shutterfly in a few days. My storage binder/albums will be here tomorrow and then I can get to sorting. It's exciting really going through all the pictures, and the layouts:

Here I've flagged what type of layouts I've made. My least common? "People I love", how crazy is that. Even crazier? Despite all my travels my "place I go" category was a close second. I think that is because I do a lot of separate albums for those layouts though. My least used of the who, what, why, when, where was where, so the layout that combines both of my least was people/where. I made up this one of Emilie tonight to start filling that gap:

I'm excited to go through the photos I get back. Just looking at them again on my computer has made me want to scrapbook more, and I'm thinking that holding them and filing them will bring up even more memories I want to capture. Added plus? Using long forgotten scrapbooking supplies like fibers and pebbles stickers and random Japanese stationary.

Our 88 year old kid

Grandpa turned 88 yesterday. So he put on his flat fronted khaki's and came down to the special dining room to party!

Yes, I brought back the hats from Bj's party last year (from left: Bj, Brent, Taylor, Jim, Grandpa, Kathy, Mom (Julie), Bill). Kat didn't quite get in the picture, nor I, as the photographer (this tends to be a problem with being the designated shooter).

Kat with my brothers. Seems like Brent picked the perfect girl as they both make ridiculously funny faces at the camera. They also brought Henry (per my request, little doggies sure cheer up grandpa):

Can I get an awe?!?!

This is grandpa's "I'm trying to look mean but not succeeding face." I think it's so funny. He is in a lot of pain ("I want a goddamn new butt!") but managed to hang out with us for almost an hour and a half. That's a lot of sitting (he spends most of the day laying). Kathy said, "you'll feel better on your next birthday!" To which he replied, "ya when they throw dirt in my face." Geez grandpa, it cracked up the whole table though. And I know he's' just doing it for laughs as he wants to be cremated anyway, so there won't be any dirt, LOL. We (well Bj and Kathy) cooked him dinner. Fish, crispy mashed potatoes (like fried mash potatoes), and green beans. His number one complaint (except his butt, of course) is the food, so we thought this would be a good present.

Grandpa blew out all his candles in one breath. Not eighty eight of them, but a bunch in the shape of an eighty eight. The cake was insane by the way.

That's, count them, 15 layers! She whips these up in like an hour and a half, but I guess that makes sense, as a cake that thin can't take long to cook. Now I don't eat brownies, chocolate cake, chocolate ice cream, or chocolate frosting (barf-o-rama) so Kathy made me my own little dessert.

Damn, the thing was over half frosting (and a divinity frosting at that), with sparkles!! Mmmmm. She made me two. I ate the second for breakfast this morning, oops! Grandpa opened his presents after dessert and I looked over to see him doing this.

I was like, what the heck?

What a goof.

Love ya grandpa!

12 Hour Baby Surprise Jacket

I knew I had a baby shower to go to today, but I had so many other projects on my plate that I hadn't started any kind of gift by Thursday evening. Then I panicked a bit I knew I wanted to knit something, and I have all those great vintage mags now, but decided I could get a baby surprise jacket done in a day. So I cast on and did a few rows Thursday night, and then worked Friday morning. So at 3:45pm I had this:

Yikes. So I knit, and knit, and knit. And seamed and had everything done but the buttons when I went to bed last night (um this morning) at 3am. Got the buttons on and was only a few minuets late for the shower. I did it!

I used Socks That Rock Medium Weight. I loved it. I was afraid it would pool a few times, so I broke the yarn in a couple places and re-started.

She loved it!

My cousin Tia. She look so gorgeous and happy.

Feeling the little baby kick.

I love the table runner my aunt made... with moss! So cute. I took a few shots of a little boy there whose mom said she never got good shots of him (he's very bubbly and moves a lot).

I got a few I thought were sweet.
Speaking of pictures for others, I am bringing Kristen and Eric their engagement photos on a disc tonight when we meet up with them to hang out. I went back through the shot and had forgotten about two I set up, but Bj actually took of me:

I love this juicy jacket, hey I would wear it every day if I could.

I had just jumped out of the portico. I love how just jumping down fluffed up my hair. :) I don't dye my hair, but this time of year with out sun shinning it starts to seem so dull and flat. It's all I can do to keep it natural. Next time the sun comes out (not looking likely any time soon, we are getting loads of rain), I plan on going outside no matter how cold. Or at least driving around with my sun roof open!

The big reveal

I have been keeping a secret. A bunch of people around here knew it, but Ceara didn't, and I don't think I've kept a secret from her for this long ever. Let me give you a little back story. Way back. It's 2003. I'm in Corvallis, I've got crew going on, school and thus art projects galore, and I decide that I want to do something extra cool for Ceara's Christmas present. Extra cool, and it turns out, way over my head. I get a library book and have Ceara go through it and tell me which quilts she likes. Then I don't tell her which one I'm going to do, but end up picking this cool star quilt in the book. I set about getting the million different shades of blue I need for it, and start cutting and piecing. And at Christmas time, I get to show her this:

Not quite the finished product I was hoping for, but I still had a week or so left of break so I got to sewing. And I had this:

Now comes the problem. I had to actually quilt it. The book called for some insane swirls and waves, and the stars where sort of "in-lined" (like out-lined, but on the inside on the seam). I thought I should start with the stars. My mom had just gotten a cool new sewing machine, and the add-on of a table extension thing so that you can wrangle the quilt a little better. So I would roll up the quilt as tight as possible and then try to quilt the little bit I could shove under the machine. This did not work well. I could not get tension, the bobbin color kept popping up to the front. So I decided for the back I would use mono-filament thread (like really thin fishing line) and then I wouldn't have those problems (this came back to haunt me).  This is when I started having real problems. Things snagged, lines were wonky. It was bad. So I folded it up, and put it away. And brought it out every once and a while, looked at it and thought, hey I should work on that. I moved it three times, but no go on the finishing. I kept thinking, I should finish this for ____________ (Ceara's graduation, move, wedding, anniversary, other Christmases). But I had it so messed up I was afraid to go back to it. Finally I decided that I needed to have it professionally quilted. I spent way too much time on the piecing to just let it go. So early December I finally brought it to someone. I had to pull out all the quilting I'd done (and that clear thread stuff was a bitch). 

Then there was this other problem. I had copied the pages from the library book of the quilting, so I could remember how it went. But I couldn't find it, and so I had to go to the library and look through EVERY quilt book there. When I still couldn't find it I got one of the librarians to make me a spread sheet of every checked out quilt book, and went hunting to see what those were like online. I had about 83 of those to go through. I finally found it though, this is the book: Quick and Easy Scrap Quilts.

Then I waited two months.

Then I hand stitched on the binding for a week.

Then I sent it to Ceara. And yesterday she opened the package over iChat. I think that last time we talked about the quilt was a year ago, so ya, she was surprised.

It turned out so awesome!

The amount of stitching can be seen in the back especially.

I am sold. I am having any crazy pattern like this professionally done from now on.

Happy Friday!

ISO... OMG

So I'm going through my millions of emails per day (hey I like to sign up for stuff) and I decided to click on the Creating Keepsakes one about taking pictures of a kid and a birthday cake. I noticed it said change your ISO and since going digital I had never done it. I know, I know, I just fell like way down off the pedestal of the last post (thanks for all the complements on my photos guys!). But I'm all self taught on the digital, and just never tried it out. I always shoot on manual though, does that redeem me a little? Anyway here is why you should care:

On ISO 200 (what my camera has been on since day one I think). The lower the ISO the less light comes in, but the less noise you get also (see I do know what it is after all). We always shot with ISO 100 in photography class (ah TMax).

On ISO 400. Boring shot, I know, but I wanted something kind of darkly lit. Oh that and I just turned my butt on the stool and pointed to the nearest thing.

On ISO 800. By now I'm like, OH MY GOD.

On ISO 1600, the highest my camera will go. Now yes, there is some noise, but COME ON PEOPLE, this is FREAKING AWESOME!!!!

So embarrassing for me, but listen, I did it to help you out. Go get your camera, see if you can change this setting. Change nothing else, but that setting and snap some pictures in an area where light won't change in the one minuet this test takes. You'll thank me. Oh what, you all knew that already? Okay then, get on with your business.