Do you use Photoshop?

Or do you just own a copy of it, and wonder about the mystery of it all because it looks too complicated?

I just saw this tutorial on YouTube and thought it might be useful for anyone who is wondering how to use the scrapbooking letters I posted here and here.

I hope everyone's Monday is going faaaabulously ;)

Freebie Father's Day Alphabet Download

I had to get up at 5 am to take my dad to the airport (I know you will read this, soooo, HI DAD! You're welcome and thanks for the watermelon!) so I had lots of time this morning to finish up this set of Father's Day scrapbooking letters. I took my inspiration from the pinstripe suits that my dad always used to wear to work :)

click the pic to embiggen

The zip file containing this alphabet can be downloaded here for free*. Each character has been saved as an individual image so just open up the letters you need and get going. Father's Day is in two weeks here in the U.S. so that should give you plenty of time to play around with these!

*This alphabet set was created by me, myself, and I, for you, and may be used personally or commercially.

I shared this at:
Craft-O-Maniac Monday

Free Scrapbook Letters Download!

I love to play around in Photoshop. Today I made a few different sets of digital scrapbooking letters. I've posted the first one here as a digital download for anyone who would like to have it.*



Each letter is saved as an individual image (.png) file, just open the ones that you need and start creating.

I'll post the other letter sets as soon as I finish saving all the files. I have a cramp in my mouse hand right now so I might take a long break. Files should be up sometime in the next week :)

Have fun!

*This alphabet set was created by me and may be used personally or commercially.

I shared this at:
Check me out Saturday

He drew a cat for me!

I am going to live on a farm one day and I asked Steve of I want to draw a cat for you fame to draw a picture of what that might look like. He posted it up on the website today. It's a cat milking a cow standing next to a sheep. The cat is listening to Bon Iver (YouTube link) on his iPod. Thanks, Steve!

Easy on the eyes

You can't help but scratch your head as the Yankees destroy our beloved A's.

Do you have Instagram for the iPhone? Every picture comes out infinitely better when I use it. Case in point, I took a very boring picture on Monday night at the A's-Yankees game. Instagram made it interesting. Don't know how, but they did. And it's free! Instagram is also a social network, so when you take pictures they are automatically shared out into the network of other users. You can follow people and "like" their pictures and leave comments.

Taken this morning, while walking at 3.5 mph

Instagram can really turn your pictures into art. There are all sorts of little flip and tricks embedded in it that allow you to make enhancements. I used the tilt-shift feature for the picture of the geese on the path. Basically, it allows you to focus in on a certain part of the picture (in this case, the geese) and blur everything else.

Disobedient geese!

The sharing aspect of the app may not be for everyone so there are settings that allow you to make your photos private. If you're interested in seeing a little about how the app works I found this video on YouTube.

In other news, I got my Starbucks gold card in the mail yesterday so I celebrated by destroying my old one. Et voila, the mini Starbucks notebook!



I had another old card cluttering up my wallet so I used it for the back cover. For the inside pages I just cut a few pages out of another notebook and printed out one sheet of graph paper on my printer. I then cut those pages down to fit the notebook, rounded the corners, and bound it all together. BTW, the Fiskars corner rounder is a dud. I have this one and it ruins more corners than it cuts (I had to fix most of them with scissors). I really like all of their other products but this one is a b-o-m-b. No matter though, the notebook still works :)

Happy Thursday, everyone!

And then there were two

Hi, my name is Cheryl and I apparently like offset pink flowers. Thankyouverymuch.

Posie Ring

I became interested in fabric button rings when I saw this tutorial at Smashed Peas and Carrots. I had some fabric and a button blank so I picked up some ring blanks with pads at Michael's (2 for $5.99) yesterday and made one for myself. I used Mod Podge Hard Coat because it was the only thing that I had on hand, but I don't think I would recommend it for this project. It took about 10 coats to get good coverage and the finish is satin, when I would have preferred the look to be more glossy. Lesson learned for next time I make one: Use the stuff recommended in the tutorial.

The button is attached to the ring blank with hot glue. I tried to use Aleene's clear gel tacky glue but after sitting overnight it had not even begun to dry.

I like my little pink flower ring, right now I am wearing it with jeans and a polar fleece hoodie.

Stylin'!