Just Some Blog Info

/* EDIT: I will leave this as a sticky for this week. Scroll down for the latest post. Thanks! */

I rearranged and organized my blog and made a few changes which I think will help you who are here for my tutorials.

As you problably know, you can click on either “Technique” under the categories or “Video” and “Tutorial” under tags to get to the tuts. Well, even though you do get to the items, you can’t really sort through them quickly. So, what I did was create a new page (WordPress gives me the ability to create pages — the plus of WP compare to Blogger) and there you can browse through the titles. Everything is in one page. When I have more tuts I’d like to sort this better, but for now, I think it’s a lot easier to sort through than going through post after post to search through the tutorials.

To get to the page, just look at the top right. It’s listed under the “Main Menu” or for a direct link, it is here. This page will automatically update thanks to the category page plugin. I have also moved my blogroll to its own page (used blogroll link plugin) and you can find that under the main menu also.

I will be changing my theme but when that happens, the settings will still be the same, the “Main Menu” might just move a little bit.

Thanks for visiting my blog. I really appreciate all the comments and I am trying to be a better blogger by also visiting your blogs and commenting. I am really glad that you find my tutorials useful and feel free to link from your blog or other forums that you might be active in (see Creative Commons agreement). Just please don’t download the videos (or freebies) and claim it as your own — it ain’t cool {::SMILES}.

Tut: Tour of SplitCoast Stampers Pt. 1

I created this to help a new user at SCS. I’ll be creating a Photoshop tutorial too this week. Stay tune!

Oh, in the user control panel there is a profile picture and an avatar. I think most of you know what an avatar is but if you don’t, it’s the little image that shows up under your username (if you added one of course) each time you post in the gallery or the forum. The profile image can be larger and you can only view this if you go to your profile page.

Again, I created this using the SplitCoast site, but, this pretty much works for the majority of other forums/galleries. The big difference is that in others outside SCS, to get to the control panel you just click on the “User CP.”

Tut: How to Add Keywords to a Gallery Upload

My friend asked me how to add the keyword to a card she created for a challenge and that’s how this tutorial came about. I hope others will find this useful also.

Note: This tutorial applies to all galleries that has a keyword options. After submitting to all sorts of gallery, it seems like most use the same photo application and if not, the idea is the same. Some have the keyword before the upload, some after, you just have to get use to each system’s settings.

Haven’t done any scrapbooking or card making in the last few days. I’ve just been doing a lot of housework including gardening and shopping for the basement. I’ll add more stuff later and I have an awesome news to share.

H&M Stamps and TDC GC Winners

I have some winners!!! The M randomizers picked:

#9: Patty

Patty posted the following on April 21, 2008 at 1:02 pm. - Edit

This is actually the first time I’ve visited your blog. I’ve never stamped before, but am interested in getting started, so I’ve been blog browsing and got linked to yours from somewhere!

Patty, please email me your address. You can click on the Contact Me link on the top right and use the form or email me at stampin (at) scrapbit (dot) com. I also need you to tell me which stamp set you’d like to receive.

For The Digi Chick winner, M picked the following:

#14: Zakirah.

Zakirah posted the following on April 21, 2008 at 12:37 pm. - Edit

Lucky you!! Totally deserve it ~ congrats!! I saw you gallery at DST and your work is amazing. Wishing you a happy and fun time making projects with the awesome stuff by the TDC designers!!

Zakirah, I have your email address but please contact me so that I can confirm it with you and I’ll email the gift certificate code to that email address. I’ll make the purchase after I hear back from you.

Thanks everybody for playing!! Congrats to the winner.

Animoto

I get distracted easily, especially if there’s a new application. I got this info from one of my Tweet buddy and the app is called Animoto. What is it? Check it out yourself, BUT, if you are in education and if your classroom is interested in using this, you can get the extended service for a year free. Kind of like some other photo slide shows (e.g. Photobucket) but I think it’s a bit more funky with how the music effects the images. Ok, maybe I’m just a bit cheezy {::SMILES}.

What I like about Animoto is that you can grab photos from different locations (Flickr, Facebook, etc.). To test this out, I just grabbed some photos from my Flickr folder. I should have done one with my cards or pages with some jazz, huh? It was so fun and easy. I remember doing a video for my multimedia class years ago (I blew up Idaho’s capital building, ha!). It took me a few days to do something like this (too bad I can’t find the tape - yes, tape!).

Ok, if you’re not into web stuff but want to create a photo slideshow manually and not have to upload anything online, check out Microsoft’s free Photo Story. In education, this can be used to create a digital storybook. One student who’s teaching actually had her students (3rd graders) create the digital story that I assigned as homework. They all had a blast. It’s super easy to do and you can send your file via email. Let your kids have fun and send grandma some cool photo stories.

As a note, I’d like to use more (hip) music in my tuts too but I don’t want to go through the copyright process or pay. There are free music but I have no time to go through them. Maybe one day.

Smile

I used Pencil Line sketch to help me with this LO. This was March’s sketch. Here’s the story behind the title… When M was a baby, up to two years I think, she was not the most generous kid in terms of smiles. She’s even tougher when it came time to take studio photos. We’d do everything and we’d just get a stare and she she did smile, either the camera person wasn’t ready or she blinked. So these are a few photos that we got from Sears. There’s one good smiling photo and the rest looked like she didn’t care to be there… of course there’s got to be one where she either has something, her hand/thumb usually, in or in front of her mouth.

Now she’s a totally different person. Quite friendly although there have been days where she’s just not camera friendly or will not smile for people she doesn’t know well. Her excuse… “Emma’s grumpy.”

Now, does any of you have a Ning account? Ning is a social networking account. Once you have one, you can create a group of your own or join another group. It’s like Yahoo group but with a better interface. I’ve used my Ning account to join educational groups… so work only… but recently I just joined two scrapbooking groups: Pink Paislee and Scrapbook Dimensions Magazine. If you’re not socialed out yet, check Ning out and the two groups. You might like it. In my field, I find the groups I’m in very informational.

Prima Blog Candy

Are you subscribe to Prima’s blog? If not, check out their Friday giveaway. So many goodies!!!

My presentation went well except that I had no Internet access. It went down right before I clicked on the first link. Then it just went in and out but everytime I needed it, it was down. URGH!!! I had screen shots but a few things I needed to do just had to have Internet. Oh well. People said they got some good info, so that’s good.  I talked about the following:

For my online class I use: Meebo chat for virtual chat sessions/off hours, del.icio.us for my bookmarks, and YouTube for tutorials
For my  work/networking I use: Twitter and subscribed to different groups using my Ning account on top of the blog subscriptions that I follow using Google Reader
Previous items or things I use with my students: Flickr group and Flickr map (check out this map if you haven’t!)
My browser: Flock and Firefox

You can Google if you’re interested in finding out more or visit my work blog for more info. We haven’t had time to start a decent blog but planning on it soon. I have my next session this afternoon. Hopefully I have service then.

Hello from Osage Beach

I have Internet, yeah! It’s $9.95/day but I really needed it. I got what I need to do for tomorrow done, learned lots in the process of it, and even helped out with some work website issues. Now I just need to go to bed.

Ok, what to share this…  If you’ve been following the ColourLovers tutorials, I have something here for you… what happens when you click on the “Create a pattern with this palette” button? Try it out. It’s pretty cool! Select a palette first and you should get to this window.

M… poor thing, her stomach is upset or something. She threw up at the restaurant. Nice huh? Earlier she said her tummy hurts. She took a nap and after she woke up she said she’s hungry. We went to the restaurant and she wouldn’t eat and when she did take a bite of the salmon… everything came out. Thankfully, the husband is here with me. But, soon after we got back to the hotel, she was fine. Hubby, who got puked on (literally all over — M was standing on the chair right next to him and hubby was extending his arms out to pick her up) got cleaned up and decided that after all that (picking salmon out of his favorite hat and cell phone besides rinsing everything else) he needed a drink (or more). So he went to the bar and joined my co-worker for some male bonding. What an evening!

I also have a card to share. It’s an old one that I did. Thought you might like it for inspiration if you have this Big Bloom retired SU set. I think this was one of my first card where I cut a lot. I use to not like doing it but now I find the need to always cut something. This was also the first card that I created that I really like. Again, I am hard on myself.

Well, good night. Got to grab breakfast at 7 a.m.  tomorrow. The great thing about today was that the front desk knew I was bringing my M today and so our room is right next to the back door of the room they’re using for the meals, YES! My sessions are also just around the corner. NICE!!

Photo Editing

Ok, leaving for my conference in a little bit. I will not have anything new, project wise, to share until this weekend. I had plans on getting stuff ready and just automatically post for me but I never got to it. I did a few that I posted already and besides that, I’ve just been working late prepping for my presentations. Hubby said I’m going to have to much info but hey, I rather have too much and cut back as needed than the other way around. So for today, I just want to share one little item… I found out about this from my Twit buddies last week or so.

What I want to share is a new online photo editing place. If you don’t have any photo editing application on your computer or you just need to do something quick and not too overly complicated Adobe has a new online application, it’s called Photoshop Express. You can check it out and play around with it. Opening an account is free and you have a few megs to mess with. Now, if you’re a Picnik user (Flickr uses Picnik too), PE is similar. For a comparison, check out what Steve Dembo has to say. He’s quite known in my field, technology in education.

Alright, got to finish packing. I’ll check back in later if I have Internet in my room. M’s so excited to go. She’s been packed since last night and dragging her big back pack around all morning. She looks super cute too (she ALWAYS pick out her own outfit) and I should get some pics.  If anybody out there are ed. techs or in IT, let me know, I’d be happy to share my work on: Actual use of Web 2.0 Technology (beyond blogs and wikis) and using Joomla and WordPress (MU) for faculty or organization sites (they’re both geared towards higher ed but can be applied to K-12). Bye!

Once Upon a Time

This is the other page that I did for the Scrap Artist challenge. I thought I was suppose to do two pages from whatever kit and not one from my own kit and one from the freebie kit. Last night at midnight was the cut-off date and time. I’m just waiting to see what the results are. You can see the submissions in their gallery. Quite a bit, huh? Not hoping much, but we’ll see. Like I said, I had fun, got some LOs done, AND got a free kit. What else can I ask, right?

The Internet is a BAAAAD thing for me. Especially now that I’m so into challenges and contests AND blog candies. I’ve never gotten anything from the last but it was still always fun to participate in all and hope that maybe one day I can get some cool freebie. I can’t do them all but I’m trying to do something from the different ones that I love. Prima has a new monthly sketch contest now. It’s called Prima’s Build-a-Page. You get prizes. Just don’t forget to submit your layout by the 25th. I love the sketch and I have the perfect photos — just found them last night {::SMILES}.

Do you know that PaperTrey has a blog hop contest each month on the 25th? I just found out today but I might try it for next month. I love their stuff. If you have a blog and either have or will be getting some PTI stuff, watch our for April’s hop. Should be fun. I should put it in my calendar, huh? {::SMILES}

Ok, have a great day. We just did our taxes yesterday and I feel so good (although both our muscles were tense during the process). I hate tax time. It was also nice too that we didn’t have to pay. I think the tax people made a mistake but whatever, they did check two-three times. I’ll let you know if we go to prison, ha! It might not be bad… more time to scrapbook and make cards… ha ha ha… I wonder if I’d be able to blog too… ok… enough of that… laters…