Drawing for Free Christmas Gift Tags

I'm procrastinating.

You may be wondering what I'm procrastinating about.

Cleaning.

Not the normal everyday kind of cleaning, but cleaning things out. Getting rid of things. Trying to decide what to keep, what to give away and what to donate. Almost a quarter of my bedroom is already full of things to donate. I was trying to donate this stuff to an organization that helps out women, but they don't seem to want to come it, and I don't have a car to take it there. My daughter suggested another organization - so I guess I'll finish this up and call them!

And speaking of giving things away - these are the last 3 gift tags for my drawing on NOv 1st.

If you have already left a comment under the other post, you don't have to under this one. You can if you want - I always welcome comments!!!

So, yes I decided on 6 different ones. I hope you like all of them!!!

HOST TRUNK SHOW

Check it out!

Drawing for Christmas Gift Tags

So, I have finally finished creating and taking pictures of the tags to be given away. To be entered in the drawing, leave me message under this post. Drawing will be held Nov 1st, 2008!
What do you think - 4, 5, or 6!?

More pictures soon!

New Things

The Original photo
"Memories"

After some manipulation and adding a digital frame!

Exploring different websites, finding new things (new for me anyway) through photobucket.

Morning glories are pretty much my favorite flower. But, they also bring back a lot of memories. My grandmother who lived in Ft. Lupton, CO had a large bricked in planter in front of her porch - that loads of beautiful blue morning glories grew. The past four years, I've been growing morning glories in small planters on my patio and collecting seeds for the next year. Finally getting a digital slr camera this past May, I've been able to expand my photography work. I've used a film slr camera for years, but just haven't been able to afford to do much with all these slides I have. This digital stuff is pretty cool! I'm really sort of purist at heart, I usually look at something and think of how I want the end result to look, and take a picture with the settings that I think will give me that.
When I took the original photo of the morning glory and then titled it "Memories", this just wasn't going to work! It was one morning glory! And our memories are plural, and often influenced by past and future memories. So, I decided some manipulation was called for. Like our memories, the result is layers in different transparencies. Then I stared adding some digital frames - just so that it give people a little idea of what it may look like framed. Not sure I really like these frames that much - but perhaps they are better than nothing - maybe not!

I recently bought a Jack O'Lantern Lantern for my grandson, and on a whim took a picture of it one night. I was so excited over how the picture turned out, I started playing around more with setting up different scenes, taking numerous pictures and then editing some of the photos, taking objects from one and adding it to another.
Some of the end results have 4 or 5 objects added to one background. They have been fun to do, and certainly something I want to play around with more.
And then this morning, I discovered scrapblog! No telling how long this has been around - but I just found it and here's the result of that discovery!

http://scrapblog.com/lisianblue

Have a wonderul day, and thanks for visiting my blog!

My Favorite Holiday Part 2

Another one of my cards that I made - available at http://lisianblue.etsy.com

When my kids were little, I made their costumes. One year, I made a snowwhite dress for my daughter - and my son - was a space alien of sorts. One of my favorite costumes I came up with. I took one of his one piece pajamas - oh I think he was maybe 2 or 3, and added a felt collar, and sewed different colors of yarn to a strip of bias tape, then put that down the sleeves. Took a headband and wrapped a couple of pipe-cleaners around it - with the majority of them sticking up and added a styrofoam ball to each that had glitter glued all over them. then some little black boots. A little bit of makeup - It was all cheap and fun to put together! He looked so cute!

So what is it about Halloween that makes it so fun. The candy - well yeah that's part of it. Dressing up and getting to be someone - something we aren't - that was definitely part of it. Part of it is a link back my ancestors - although certainly changed - and usually not acknowledged - that's where it started. Back in the pagan days, no not satanic, no not evil, just different. It's fun going from house to house to get treats -

It's not fun walking around a mall and getting cheap candy that is the same from store to store. It's fun to see what your friends are dressed up as. I kind of remember a few times doing a parade sort of thing in elementary school - everyone took turns going from class to class - just a a parade sort of thing to check out everyones costumes.

I still enjoy dressing up. And I really enjoy decorating outside around my apartment. I love the comments as the kids come by. Last year, I sat outside for a while. I think some of the kids thought I was a fake witch - they would walk right past me and knock on the door. That was fun.

Maybe I'll try to start decorating soon. The people next door to me already have a few things out. I'm not sure I'll get a lot of decorating done this year - just not much energy.

My Favorite Holiday

Next to Christmas anyway! Halloween!
And this year, I'm making Halloween cards that are for sale in my etsy shop.

http://lisianblue.etsy.com/

I have always loved Halloween. Maybe it was partly the dressing up, the masquerade. Partly the candy. And definitely about the pinon nuts! An older (?) man lived down the street that would go gather pinon nuts every year, and that's what he gave out at Halloween. He'd roast them, put a handful in a square of aluminum foil and they were better than any candy as far as I was concerned.

I think I really enjoyed dressing up too - although I don't really remember any of my costumes! Except one. I don't remember exactly - but I think I wore one of my dads shirts - so of course it was way too big for me, a pair of leotards, some tennis shoes, some beads of my mothers, and a grey felt tam - I was a beatnik. That's the only costume I remember.

It's possible that I enjoyed it even more when I had my 2 kids to take out trick-or-treating. And for us that was quite an excursion because we lived about 25 miles out of town. Then after a few years we lived a little over 30 miles out of town. We tried different neighborhoods a few times. One year we went to an area that is right on the edge of town - a rather well to do neighborhood. It was one of most disappointing years we had! The houses were far apart - and they actually gave out pretty cheap lousy candy. One year we did the mall thing. That was enough - we never did that again. But, what seemed to be the best place - the neighborhood where I grew up and of course my dad and my step mom enjoyed seeing the kids dressed up! Of course the man that had given out pinon nuts had moved away long ago. The family that lived there while I was growing up were still there - they gave out full size candy bars! One year, my daughter was sick and unable to go - so my son and I went, and I trick-or-treated for her. She got a lot of candy that year! So did I!
To be continued...........