Holiday Time

Hi All

Just stopped by to say, me and my family are off on holiday tommorrow for a week, so no blog posts I'm afraid, but should have lots of nice pictures to come back with and write about!

Gutted I am missing the last week of Shimelle's class, but hopefully i can catch up with it! Take care this week. I'll leave you with some pictures of our holiday last year. I played around with actions and clipping masks again! he he!

Loves xxxx

Out of my comfort zone

Happy Friday

Sorry for the lack of posts this week. I have been nannying a little girl and her friend for the last four days. It was actually good fun. I felt very maternal and I tried to get them out of the house as much as possible because it was such a lovely sunny week. We played in the park for hours, had a picnic and two treasure hunts! All in all a good time...and I got paid, so thankfully no longer skint!

In LYPLYP a few days ago we were asked to find our photography comfort zone and then the next prompt was to move out of it. My comfort zone is people. It always has been. the reason I scrap is to record those special events with people, those everyday moments with people and my lfie as a teenager with my friends.

I photograph people to record moments like this:

Occassions like this:

And memories like this:

For me, breaking out of my comfort zone is taking pictures of inanimate objects. Ok, I do a few landscapes every now and again and I did a bit for photography AS, but otherwise, taking pictures of objects out of choice freaks me out!

I also thought that I would take this prompt the whole way. I never ever shoot in black and white. I am not adverse to black in white. I actually love it. I just figure if I shoot in colour i can always convert to black and white! If you haven't shot in black and white either, give it a try. Its actually really interesting because you become far more creative. the picture has to have a great composition for that is what stands out. Not the colour.

Because i am crazy I also decided to try some post processing editing. I never do this either. Take life as it is is my motto, but I did find some lovely actions on the Coffee shop blog! (try it out, honestly, its fab!) So..these are my results! (ok, a few people did sneak in! eeep!)

So, that is the story of the comfort zone! Now I have a bit more time, I will hopefully stop by for another post sometime soon.

Thanks for reading.

Loves xxxxx

History

Happy Monday
I have spent the day with an 11 year old girl..enough said. No, she is lovely and we had a great day doing lots of crafty stuff! mwah ha ha! i think shimelles class will take a bit of a back seat this week though!

Yesterday my family and I went to a living history day. It was amazing. Loads of battles, plenty of people dressed up in period costume and a real enthusiasm for history in general. It was a great hands on day and I took hundreds of pictures. Just a few here:

Plenty of Vikings!

The guy on the right wanted to buy me so I could become his slave! Lol!

Amazing craftsmanship here!

The littlest one thought the whole day was amazing. I mean whats not to love? Explosions, loud bangs, guns and swords!

Sorry for the short post. I finish nannying on thursday, so hopefully more of a blog post then! thanks for stopping by!

Loves xxxx

Boy meets Girl

Happy Saturday
Have been doing my most recent page for Shimelle's class, Love your pictures, love your pages. The sketch immediatly grabbed me because it used four square photos. I have never done something like that before so I thought..why not have a go!

(I'm sorry, this is another post about the boy, you can switch off now if you want!). I absolutly love scrapping pictures of the boy. probably because I have so much I want to say and two because I get to gaze at his photo and not feel guilty! he he!

If you have never used Picnik, please try it out. I made a photo collage of the four photos in seconds and even managed to add this yellow filter which makes the pictures look somehow timeless...

I chose some of my all time favourite pictures of him and me, cut them out and layered them up...

The layout isn't actually this dark. My camera was having a funny five minutes! I love how it turned out though. I wanted to keep to a tight colour scheme and to chose colours that felt elegant to match with the black and white photos. I kept most of my embellishment to the middle of the page with the pictures. For me, there is a lot of white space on this LO, slightly scary as I feel I want to fill it with something!

Although I wanted to keep the page elegant I also wanted an element of fun. hence the note paper and the type writer title!

The journalling reads:

2 years later, you still make me laugh, you make me so happy and you still humour my need for photos!

Perhaps because of its simplicity, this has turned out to be one of my favourite LO's with all my favourite pictures on it!

A few more details:

I am loving the use of twine at the moment to grunge up a layout slightly!

The colours are better in these photos.

Hope you all have a brilliant weekend. I am nannying for a bit next week so posts may not come as frequently! Oh and I would love some advice. I changed my blog to a three column the other week, but am not sure if I like it, what do you think?

Thanks for stopping by!

Loves xxxxxx

Another Layout

Hi

Ok, this is a bit later than billed as yesterday afternoon, but hey, kept you all in suspense about the latest LO!

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I am kind of worried because this is the third layout in a week. Something must be wrong with me! he he!

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So..this is one I made with some fairly recent pictures of my brother. (The middle one, not the little one). I was struck with how grown up he looked. We have such a good relationship with each other, being so close in age and he has now realised that cooperating is the best way to appease me when it comes to photography!

Again for me it is relatively simple. At the moment I seem to be loving using a select choice of patterned paper and then including lots of little details in the embellishment. One thing I love about this layout is the blue border. So easy to do. Get a plastic ruler and a paint dabber. Paint the edge of the ruler evenly in paint and then press on the edge of the cardstock! simple!

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I always have a problem trying to make a boy page look sophisticated and not too "frilly". Thats why here I used staples to hold the paper in place and string rather than ribbon. Adds a bit of grunge I think!

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A few more details:

Thanks for stopping by. Hope you all have a great day!

Loves xxxx

Exposure tutorial

Hi all. .

Thanks for all the lovely comments over the last few days! you are all so lovely. From stopping by on a few blogs, I think a lot of people are confused about exposure when taking pictures on full manual mode. I am honestly no expert but this is something we had to learn for photography AS, so I thought I would share...

This is the exposure triangle and if all of these seprate parts work together you have a nicely exposed picture.

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Shutter speed: I think everyone knows that if you have a long shutter speed you get that nice motion blur and a fast one you can freeze stuff like water droplets? Shutter speed also contributes to exposure. Fairly straightforward.

The slower the shutter speed the more time the light has to go in so... the lighter the photo

The faster the shutter speed the less time the light has to go in so...the darker the photo.

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Aperture: Here is a little diagram I found on the internet:

I think you all know that a large Aperture (F/2 for example) gives a nice shallow depth of field and vice versa for a small aperture. Aperture also works for exposure. Look at the large aperture diagram and the lens is wide open. More light can therefore get in and...guess what.. a lighter picture. Same with a small aperture.. hardly any light comes in so darker picture.

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ISO: This is basically how sensitive the camera is to light. A good rule of thumb is the higher the ISO number, the lighter the picture becomes. Beware of this though because the higher the number, the granier the picture is as well.

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So...basically. Here is an overexposed picture:

To get it at the right exposure I have three options..Shutter speed, Aperture or ISO.

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I personally, always use shutter speed first. With this picture it is clear the shutter speed was too slow because the lens has been opened for too long, allowing too much light in. Therefore I need to make the shutter speed faster, meaning less light can come in.

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Here is another option:

This picture is quite underexposed. The first thing I would do would be to adjust the shutter speed. The picture is too dark because the shutter speed is too fast (the lens hasn't been opened long enough for enough light to come in) I would make the shutter speed slower.

Because its quite a dark room though, the shutter speed would need to be quite slow for it to be correctly exposed, that means more chance of camera shake and a blurred photo.

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So...I have two other options. first ISO. I can push that up to say 800 and the picture will get lighter but there will be quite a lot of grain.

Or.. I can adjust the aperture and rather than it be on F5 I could make it F1.6.

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Most pictures you will need to fiddle with all three aspects to get a correct photo. It really is just experimenting! Again, I am no expert and I'm sure others could explain this in a much easier way but I just wanted to share how I make a picture exposed on manual mode!

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And..later this afternoon I'll share a new layout! woo hoo!

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Thanks for stopping by

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Loves xxxx

You turn my frown upside down..

Hi .

This boy is in Scotland! Scotland! Do you know how far away scotland is????! He's so sweet though and texts each night and quite literally "turns my frown upside down"! Gotta love him.

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So, in Shimelle's class the prompt was to use the ground as a tripod and take pictures from there. i used my fixed 50 mm lens. On second thoughts it probably wasn't the best idea as it doesn't have auto focus. Therefore picture me lying on the ground in our back garden desperately trying to focus a camera! I love the results though because of the gorgeous depth of field. happy smiles!So glad a car didn't come along at this point! eeek. what I do in the name of art!Cricket stumps. Common thing in our house. This is probably my favourite photo because of the colour and angle of the tree. My brother gave me such a strange look when I told him to continue watching TV whilst I got down on the floor and proceeded to take photos of him. When I told him it was for the class I am doing he rolled his eyes. So far he has seen me getting up close to him to get good depth of field and take in depth photos of tea cups as well as balancing a teddy on the windowsill. I don't blame him if he thinks I've gone mad! Lol!

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Had another driving lesson today. Managed to reverse around a corner! a car who was waiting for me went past after I'd finished reversing and the driver gave me a huge wave and a big thumbs up so I assume it wasn't too bad! parallel parking next lesson! ahhhhh! Warning do not park your car on the roadside this week! Abi is on the loose!

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Thanks for stopping by. enjoy your day.

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Loves xxxx

If there is one thing...

Hi All

I have a new layout to share, exciting!!!! two in one week has to be a first for at least a year! eeep! anyway in response to the title..

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If there is one thing that I would like to tell everyone then its BACK UP YOUR FILES.

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Yesterday I put my memory stick in the USB port and it didn't register.

I thought "ugh oh!" double clicked on it and the heart stopping message came up..

" Your memory stick isn't formatted"

I had a minor argument with the computer at this point, assuring it that it was.

It then proceeded to tell me that if I carried on with formatting it " all data will be lost."

After a mad rush to the laptop in the hope that the home computer was just being weird, I realised that my memory stick may be dead.

My wonderful father after calming down his panicking daughter installed some data recovery software and we got some of it back.

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I am just so thankful that one, all my photos were backed up on the home computer and two that it is the end of the year therefore all coursework on there and module images for photography have been handed in. What a blessing. I don't know what I would have done if it was the middle of the school year. The thought sends me out in a sweat! So...back up your stuff. EVERYTHING!

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So, the layout. I dare you to look at this and not laugh...

It was a very easy layout to make. Compared to my normal style it hasn't got as much embellishing etc but I really like it. I made my own mist spray by mixing paint and water in an old body spray bottle! The photos on this layout are purely coincidence. In the second one my mum was just talking but it ended up looking like such a look of shock at by Dad kissing her. These photos always make me crack up cos it shows the lovely relationship my parents have but also captures some of the fun we have together as a family. Its the kind of picture that should have some victorian caption under it!

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Will hopefully stop back soon with more crafty goodness!

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Loves xxxx

New LO

Hi All .

Shock horror! A layout! Has to be a first for what 6 months??? Eeek! Am loving Shimelle's class because there are so many talented scrapbookers out there and such inspiration. Also a quick thank you to those who left such lovely comments on the pic I edited of me and the boy. If anyone stops by here and doesn't do the class, it looks like this:.

Anyway, back to the LO. This is one I did based on a sketch. As usual when I work with sketches, I don't follow it very closely, but find it really useful to kick start my creative side!

The LO documents my relationship with a little girl in year seven and how much she means to me. Also the fact that she reminds me of myself at that age as we have so much in common! I wanted to make the page sweet and girly but also have a school room feel, hence the letters and the lined paper. I love to layer up chunky embellishements, so here covered some old clothes tags with patterned paper. (you can probs still see the Jack wills one poking out though!) I made the material flowers with the same tutorial I posted a few months ago. .

So,there you have it, a new layout. Will stop back soon with more crafty goodness! Am loving this whole holiday bussiness! he he! Hope you've all had a good weekend?

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Loves xxxx

PS is anyone else having problems with blogger not registering line breaks? really annoying me!

The holidays are here!

Happy happy saturday!

The end of another school year! Very scary as I only have one more left! I love the summer, hardly any work, sun and family time! Got to be good! The last week of term was activity week and I did cooking in the school kitchens.

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It was amazing being in there with all the cooks who are clearly passionate about what they do. As well as learning to bake bread and numerous dishes we also made...CAKE! yum yum yum!

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One of the chefs specialises in sugar craft and honestly if I wasn't a scrapper this would be my hobby! In a matter of minutes she had created a sugar rose like on the top of my cake, and proceeded to show us how to make one! Incredible! So... a few pics of my finished creations and yes, that chocolate cake was as rich as it looks!

We were taught how to totally ice a cake and decorate it, so perhaps more like this in the future? hmmm..or not! .

On the last day we also made a little bear! Isn't he cute? A bit podgy but I guess all the best bears are! On a different matter, I am loving Shimelle's class at the moment. My scrapping mojo is making a serious comeback after months of too much revision to scrap. Hopefully will be able to share more pages soon! Hope you all have a great weekend.

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Loves xxxxx

Cambridge Open Day

Hi All

I Am loving Shimelle's class at the moment! We had to post an impromto photo and I posted this one of a lovely textured coloured rug! random I know but hey! (if any of you are here from the forum, please comment so I can get to know you!)

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o..the other day me and my two friends went over to cambridge for the open day. Flip me, it was a treck! Into London and then out again, but to be honest it was worth it! I was a bit iffy about the whole oxbridge thing, really going for it cos I liked the course (which I guess is a good reason). Seeing the place and getting a feel for it though made me realise I could be really happy there and I guess i fell in love...It is really so beautiful. Imagine going to Uni in some of those buildings! sigh....

We visted several of the colleges including, Trinity, clare, st Catherines, Pembroke and the treck to Hommerton which is my favourite so far! (its the last picture!)

.As well as visiting the colleges, we went to several lectures. The History lecture was incredible! The lecturer really won me over. A very dynamic speaker and I made friends with a great guy from up north who made me laugh as he had no idea what subject he wanted to study!

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The sun shone all day and we had such a fun time and a great laugh! My parents couldn't come with me so I took plenty of pics to show them!

The train journey back was epic as we jumped on the wrong tube train! Buty hey ho it was an adventure and we arrived home safe! The day gave me so much to think about. I guess I am going to go into it with a lot of prayer and if it is where God wants me to be so be it but if not, I know he has bigger plans! Makes it much less daunting!

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Hope you've all had an awesome few days. Thanks for stopping by

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Loves xxxx

The Leavers Ball

Hi All

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Last week of term! eeek! Year 12 is almost finished. Very scary thought! Have a lot to blog this week and amazingly I have lots of time because we are on activity week now. So..yesterday we had the leavers ball. All of the sixth form are invited. It was an amazing evening with an Alice in Wonderland theme!

There were so many sweet touches like these tags on the bottles. The doorway to the marquee was in the shape of a keyhole, the cocktails were named after different things from the story, the drinks were poured out of teapots and the dance floor was a black and white chessboard!(above two photos atributed to my nurse at school who is a fab photographer!) The best part for me was when pudding arrived. It was chocolate mousse but served in a teacup with cream and a sprinkled cocoa key on top! So sweet! (so gutted I didn't get a picture though)A few more details. Everyone looked so beautiful and because it was such a glorious day, I took so many pictures! scrapbooking time me thinks! Here are just a small selection...

I'm the little one! even with heels on! he he!

Some of the shoes were incredible! Me and a friend..Yes he is a giant and yes I am very small!My Man and his mates! he he! We all had such a lovely lovely evening. It was a nice occassion to just chill with people before the summer and enjoy good food and plenty of music and dancing!

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And..please indulge me...a few pics of me and the boy from the ball! (Had to take an oppertunity when he is all smart!)

Hope you've all had a great weekend! Thanks for stopping by!

Loves xxxxx