13 posts tagged “photoshop”
For the first time in the many times the kids have gone back and forth between the Ex and I... This time feels permanent. She is almost 18 this time, she has a partner that she is moving in with. She is making plans for her future. It has left me with a bit of an empty spot.
I joked for years about how I would never NEVER suffer from empty nest syndrome. Actually looked forward to finally having time to do all those things that I wanted to do! But with the daughter moved out and the addition of my youngest hardly ever home due to football and his new found friends. The house is just... too quiet. All the places I wanted to take the kids to see, the places to do stuff, movies, games... they are no longer young enough to appreciate it anymore. It's all a headache to them to do silly stuff like going sight seeing, going for long rides, having their pics taken in front of silly stuff. They have their own agenda's now.
Sooo... my secret is trying not to dwell on it. I have gotten alot of editing done and my house is really really clean lol. I am starting to have time to stop and smell the flowers. I got my backyard looking awesome yesterday, hammock is set-up. Workout bench and some seating for if the son has friends over to lift weights. Pic-nic table, yard is weeded.. yeah it was gorgeous outside yesterday and I didn't have to stop mid job to drive anyone anywhere woot!!!
I noticed a bit of change in my editing last night, I think it may be from the changes in my life, I got an invite from a "whimsical group".. a year ago I was getting invites from groups catering to goth and graveyards. So yeah things are starting to look up! :D
So, where to start.
It's only 10:00 a.m. and I have...
half of my laundry done already
vacuuming done
dishes done
living room done
beds stripped
Still need to do...
yard work (that will have to wait now.. too hot!)
counters wiped down
floors mopped
bathrooms cleaned
So basically I am half done with chores yay!
The best and worst of the deal... I now have an extra room of my own to do with as I please. The daughter moved back to Illinois, Arizona was too hard on her. 18, out of school, no friends... She moved back to her hometown. I can't blame her, it's hard to start all over in a new place when you know no one. At her age you need friends, it takes years to learn that you can amuse yourself right? Ok.. we always need friends who am I kidding!
So at first, I thought hey, I can get some stuff out of storage and go through it in there.. then I got it cleaned up and saw this little sign I had made for my last work out room and decided hell with storage space, I need my work out room back! So that will be my last chore of the day. Moving all my work out gear in there! One thing that is totally cool out here in AZ is that the weight bench can be left outside! Glad I don't have to bring that in. The nights and dawn are perfect for working out too, nice and cool.
Fall is almost here, I am looking forward to a nice warm (not hot) season. I have intermittent bouts of missing New England, but we have plans to drive up to the Flagstaff/Sedona area soon. That should be enough to remind me of how green the world is :)
I am also slowly getting back into editing mode. I have been scrounging around in my older albums and looking at alot of photos in a whole new light! It is such a good idea to never delete old photos, beauty that may not be here today, might show up tomorrow!
Hope everyones summer was great and not too wet!
And ooooh we have sooo much sunshine!
I am loving living in AZ, quite simply it has given me the love of my art back again.
I spent the day editing and talking to an old friend from my Star Wars Galaxies days. We reminisced and looked at old screenshots and sighed over the loss of what should have been one of the best games in the history of MMO's.
All in all, life is good! The hubby just got word from the boss that he is going to bumped up to Manager in about 2 weeks. This means guaranteed income now yay! But.. the best part is that means that he is going to be in charge of the store that will be opening up here in our neck of the woods.. double yay!
So yeah.. life is good, the sun is shining, the house is getting organized, the sun is shining, life is getting normal.. the sun is shining... :) Yeah, the sun is shining!
First is a lily of the valley macro that I took this past spring, I decided to look up a bit of the history about it while I was editing it and came up with almost a card look.
We felt like Pilgrims on our trek across the country. I couldn't think of anything to do with this pic other than the mundane.. which I can't do!
Saying farewell to the Ozarks.
My first incoming monsoon. I took this pic as the storm was deciding on if it wanted to grow or shrink!
Backing up to 2008 and our cruise on The Music Boat. Leaving port in Miami.
Another pic from The Music Boat Cruise. We took an off boat expedition to Tulum Mayan Temples. This piece of art pre-dates the 1600's!
A boat that someone had pulled ashore on the Tulum Mayan Temple shoreline.
I like to call it *Home*... Arizona baby, granted this is a bit farther north. Heading up towards Sedona. Such grandeur and beauty.
And with that title it kinda says it all!
I am still unpacking.. you know this ;)
I am still adjusting to Arizona.. you know this ;)
I am still using way to many emotes.. you know this :D
I don't have a whole lot to write, I haven't gotten a whole lot of chances to do any photography yet, monsoon season has been hiding, other than a couple little blowby storms, there just is not a whole heck of a lot going on in my life!
I did have time to edit a few of pics though, so I will at least share those to those of you who care lol.. So, back to unpacking and or.. editing more pics. My life is so redundant atm!
Yes, I sat down today and spent the day doing near nothing. Well besides waiting til almost noon to go to the storage shed when the weather warnings said not to do anything in the mid day due to the heat warnings.. So I am a newb to the desert... hang me out to dry with the rattlers ;)
As to the rest of my lazy day, well I actually got some editing done. My new header for instance. That moon is smiling over Texas. The first rest stop that we got to after entering that beautiful state we had to pull over so that I could photograph a monsoon cloud that we had been watching off to our right. Then I turned around and saw a beautiful full moon watching me, so I decided to watch him! I finally got to use my big telescopic lens yay!
Here is the monsoon cloud that we pulled over to watch. It is a bit grainy due to the fact that it was nearly full night time when I took it so I had to leave the shutter open for a bit to catch it.
But without further ado, here are the cows with the blooming Monsoon cloud in the distance.
We're down to the wire here, only 1 more week til D-Day! The 15th is the son's last day of school and then we're free and clear to head out!
The hubby suprised me last night by picking me up a Gisteq GPS for my camera since we're going to be driving cross country and I know for a fact that there is no way I am going to remember every remote stop we make across the way to take pics. I have wanted one of these for soooo very long! I just hope that it gets here in time and doesn't delay our leave date hehe.
So nothing else new here, with all the packing going on I have not even wanted to pick up the cam nor edit any pics I already have, let's hope that this changes once we get un-packed in Arizona!
And that is about it. Coffee is starting to kick in and if I don't get off my behind and start working I will lose my motivation for the day!
Arizona or Bust!
Only a few more weeks and I get to say bye bye baby bye bye to this weather for good. We have had day after day of rain here, damn I hate arthritis!
We decided to head out of town for the holiday, I seriously think we are traveling more in the past few months then ever. Figures right? It's not as if we're packing to move or anything important heh. In all seriousness though, we had to bring some of our furniture up to the cabin before the move. It was not going with us and we had to do something with it.
There was no rain in NH this weekend yay! We got to say goodbye to family we won't see for a few years. Alot of family was at the cabin for the weekend so we got so very little sleep :). On our way home we decided to try one last time to find "The Bridge of Flowers". It is right off of beautiful Rt. 2 that I have mentioned a few times. Well, we finally found it! Wow even with it being so early in the growing season there were so many flowers to see!
So what should have been a 3ish hour ride turned into almost 8 hours. But it was well worth it :)
So, my son, despite knowing how stressed I have been, knows how to take my mind off of all the things going on in our life. He grabbed the canon and tried taking some ala myspace pics. They were a blurry mess so he asked if I would take some pics of him. So I posed him out by the birch (they are going to have to tear the birch down in order to redo the septic, that is breaking my heart :(. We only have one birch on the property and of course it is smack dab in the middle of the septic field *sigh*)
So, for a little while at least I got to take my mind off of everything going on here and snapped away.
And now it is back to packing, and trying not to look out the window as the machinery is tearing up my whole yard and pretending that they are not looking at the birch and planning on cutting it down...
This pic is my fav, he was walking past me as I snapped and it had just the smallest amount of blur to it, the b&w treatment took care of the blur though.
This is the one he liked, he likes how he is looking up at the sky. This one I actually used an infrared treatment on, it looks so cool.
A couple color images, I prefer the second one more, it brings out the dark tones. No flash used on the second one also.
My second fav, in my opinion his coloring is just really complimented by B&W when he is dressed in his grungy outfits. He likes the color ones, I think they detract from his eyes though.
I think I may be MIA til around the time of the move, I am really getting down to the wire with the move time about a month away. I still have so very much to pack and it is not going to get itself done. My list is growing daily instead of shrinking!
We have to get a whole new septic system, it failed the inspection. More $$!!
In order to do the new system, we have to clear out back patio of all our summer furniture
Have to pull up the very pretty brick patio so they can dig out the old septic *sigh*
We have to have the garbage company come out and move the dumpster
We have to empty out the trailer that the hubby uses for his woodworking cause it is sold
Find a plumber to replace the toilet and sink in our bathroom
Have to rake one acre of woodsy land of all the leaf litter and clean up downed limbs and trim bushes
Have to mow said one acre of woodsy land.. fun fun
Call the pool company and have them set up the pool for the year
Have to completely redo front for curb appeal $$ ugh
Have to repaint inside of house, the dark colors of my walls are soooo not going to sell
Two attics to go through.. yes 2 full attics of 30 years of memories
Get listings together for the local freecycle group
Clean up stuff going to freecycle
Load all of our stuff into our little van and drive it load by load to the storage units.
Yeah my kids are really starting to hate me heh. Thankfully I have sugared strawberries to bribe them with though right? lol
So that is my schedule for the next month. I took a bit of a break yesterday and played with some old macro extension tubes that I had bought when I first got my canon. I am thinking I may like these better then the macro coupler I just bought!
Enjoy and may you all have a wonderful month! Hopefully I will have time to check in now and then :)
So yeah, I am bouncing from feeling on top of the world, to being totally pissed off. I hate going to bed pissed off, it ruins the whole next day doesn't it? It doesn't help any that I have also done nothing to end the argument that started yesterday. I have this issue with being the one to give in. I am a bit of a control freak.
So enough about what is going on in my head today. All in all health wise I am still feeling awesome, the toes amazingly are not hurting like I expected! SO yay beauty won out ;)
I also created a flickr group if anyone is interested in joining. I mailed out a few friend invites but if your interested the link is Humpday Photography
So to break in the new group I had to edit some pics I took today, yeah, I have gotten almost no work done around the house today, first I talked with Raymond for quite awhile on my yahoo pingbox then I just didn't feel like doing anything. I needed a day off, every one does now and then, especially when they are in such a pissy mood right? ;) So thank you Raymond for giving me a reason to slow down and chill out. I feel better for it!
So, I had some fun this morning... can you guess what this is btw?
I layered these with some textures to give them a vintage feel. I really like how they turned out :)
And last but not least is a pic I edited from our day at Cape Cod. I just have not had time to edit all the pics I took that day yet!
The Lies of the Mother
Becoming what we wanted to be
Only to become what we never wanted
Lies covered in sugar
Protecting their young
Beautiful wings of a graceful bird
Becoming the dark encompassing wings of a raven
Changing light to shadow
Putting fear into the hearts of loved ones
Having the power to change
But taking that choice away
The lies a Mother preaches
Haunting us through the ages.
