80's

Two 80's parties in one year. Is it too much??? I hope not. But at least I have Halloween costumes set for next year!!

Photoshop is my new BFF

I recently purchased Photoshop to start playing with some of my pictures. I, by no means, understand this program completely or can use it to it's full extent, but let me tell you, this is fun!!

A special Thank you to Krista for helping me with some of the basics of Photoshop when she stayed at my house recently. She lives in AZ, and it gets a little hard to have her help me from 2000 miles away. So when she stayed with us, I jumped at the chance to have her give me some insight.

Since then, I've been playing and learning. What do you think?

BEFORE

AFTER

I think it turned out rather well, and I must say this is one of my most favorite pictures. If you all could just understand how special this was to my little C - it makes the picture even more great! Although, I think you can see some of the excitement on his face!

Although I'm not doctoring ALL of my photos (yet! just wait until I can figure out how to make myself appear 40lbs lighter) I am having a ball with Photoshop!

And wondering why all of the posts all of the sudden? We took a vacation recently, and drove to Florida! That leaves lots of time in the car to catch up and schedule posts to automatically post!

I love technology. And Photoshop!!!

Apple pickin'

The fall field trips have begun. And where else do you go for a field trip when you live in Michigan in the fall???

To the apple orchard of course! We had a somewhat rainy day, but it was still fun for the kiddos!

And the apples were Y-U-M-M-Y!!!!!

Lake Michigan

Nothing shows me Mother Nature's grace like a fall day on the shores of Lake Michigan.

SMILE!!!

I haven't just been going to class reunions and running (walking) 5k lately, I have also done a little crafting. Not alot, but some. I do plan on changing that, as I've got to get busy on some Christmas crafting. Lots of gifts to make = lots of money saved, right?!?!

My camera had a large Mickey Mouse strap on it. Now, while I love and adore Mickey Mouse, the camera strap became rather cumbersome as I would try to travel or pack my camera when we were going somewhere. And it really wasn't comfortable around my neck.


So, to my fabric stash I went, in search of something to make it more comfy and pretty! I found the fabric, but pretty soon, I realized that I couldn't cover the Mickey Mouse strap because of the adjustments on it, where you can make it shorter or longer. I went in search of the original strap. Yeah, this would be fun!

Surprisingly enough, I located it rather quickly, and the realized that it would be so much easier to use the original strap as opposed to trying to modify the Mickey Mouse one.
I cut my fabric wide enough (4x the width of the strap), so that I could fold the hem in the width of the strap, to make it more durable. For the length of the fabric, I measured the strap and added a 1/2" to each end, as to have enough to fold under and make it nice and neat. I folded and ironed the strap length wise and sewed up the open edge. Turned it inside out, and placed it over the existing strap.

Then I folded in the ends and only sewed it at the ends, the width of the strap to hold the fabric in place. I didn't sew down the edges as I wanted the fabric to have a little give and be able to move freely on my neck.

It's not such a great tutorial, so I hope that doesn't sound too confusing. It really wasn't. And once I realized that I couldn't use the MM strap, got to work on the original one, it only took about 1/2 hour. It was well worth the time, as I really like how it turned out. It makes the it more fun to take my camera out and it's more comfy to carry around my neck now!

And one more quick piece of advice - if you want to take pictures of your new, pretty strap, do it while the strap is off of your camera. It's much harder to take pictures of it when it's attached.

I'm just sayin'.

The Dirty Water Dawgs

Another 5k. This time walking. This time with my girls. and our hubbies. And one kid. And this time we were the Dirty Water Dawgs.

Thanks to Larry our colorful and incredibly entertaining tour guide in NYC this summer, we will forever be the Dirty Water Dawgs. I contemplated going into a long drawn out explanation of why "Dirty Water Dawgs" but when I started to write it out in my head (you all do that, right? write out in your head ahead of time what you're going to say?) it just doesn't have the same effect as in person. I'll give you a few highlights of the story, though. Larry the tour guide is a life long New York-er. Complete with New York accent and attitude. And he doesn't like the hot dogs you get from street vendors, because they are cooked in dirty water. Beyond that, it looses something in translation. Suffice it to say that there are 4 people on this earth that can say "Dirty Water Dawg" to me and I will forever know what they mean and it will bring a smile to my face!!!

Anywhoo, back to the 5k.

All of us girls were in town for our 20th reunion. Therefore, we thought it fitting that we do a 5k together. Hubbies ran too, as did my K. We had a group of 8. There should of been 10, but Dee and hubby were home sick. Bummer - they missed a great morning - sorry guys!

Leigh Ann, me, Sharon and Krista

That morning it was in the 40's and sunny. Quite a climate shock to the Arizona living Krista! But we did it and had a great time. Leigh Ann and I walked, while everyone else took a quicker running approach. Funny how I finished only 8 minutes slower than when I ran the 5k in August. I think I'm on to something here.

It was a great morning and a wonderful start to a fantastic weekend. It means so much to me to be able to do this together with my girls. Such awesome memories !! I think there will be another 5k in our future at Girls Weekend 2010 - Kentucky!!

Now only if I could get Larry to come and entertain us!

20 Years

Wow.....

It seems like just yesterday that I was doing my hair with a blow dryer in one hand and a can of mousse in the other. The higher the better. In the background was Madonna, New Kids on the Block or the Go Go's. My jeans were pegged, I was way too skinny (couldn't convince of that then, though), my hair was to big and my eye shadow was really blue. I'm sure I was on my way out the door to see Top Gun or something.

Yes, it was 1989. The year I graduated from High School. This weekend, I had my 20 Year Reunion, along with the class of 1988. A joint reunion.

So. Much. Fun.

Of course, all of my girls were there, as we all went to school together. And graduated in both of those classes. That evening was fantastic. So many great friends, so many laughs, so much fun. I loved catching up with people that I haven't seen in 20 years and loved seeing people that I see almost every week.

I loved high school.

I love my memories.

And I loved catching up and reliving the good ole' days!!