Disqus and Shoes

I apologize to those of you who have commented on my blog today, but had your comments disappear. I guess there is some problem with Disqus and Blogger? When I looked it up online, it looks like Disqus and Blogger were having issues two or three months ago. I don’t know why it is only affecting me now. Yeesh. I loved how I could reply to individual comments with it. Any one having the same issues? Know how to fix it?

A bunch of you commented on my shoes and how could I love on them without telling you who made them! *head slap* Of course, I should have told you. www.sofftshoes.com And if you sign up for their newsletter, they send you an email for FORTY PERCENT off one pair of shoes. So I may end up also buying the black pair. They are super comfortable.

Here are my favorites though. What do you think? 

Love both versions of these. Would they go well with my Eleonore jeans?

These are the original pumps in black. I may buy these. I also love these slouchy boots. They are out of stock. Boo.

 

I love sandals, but I’m trying to buy more shoes for work and fewer for summer. I can wear sandals to work but really only for the first couple of weeks in August and a few weeks in May. After that, it’s cold, wet, and snowy.

Experimenting with Photo Editing Software

So with my new fun camera, I’ve been experimenting a bit with photo editing software. I decided to have you people (you people!) help me out. I like simple and I like cheap inexpensive. What do you guys use?

 

Here’s a typical picture for me. It’s inside with no flash. I hate the flash but what do you do? Alaska has very little natural light most of the time so it’s hard to get decent pictures with natural light. Original picture taken inside with no flash.

 

 

Here’s the same picture using the autocorrect on my software that came with the camera. I think it’s actually pretty nice. It’s cumbersome software though making me save separately every time I crop, edit, etc.

 

Here’s Adobe Lightroom (I have the 30 day free trial) and the autocorrect. The skin tone may be more accurate in this photo than the one above.

 

Adobe Lightroom again with a few tweaks from me. I changed the exposure, contrast, and added a gradient filter to the bottom left of the photo to give the cards a little more detail. The problems with Lightroom? Well, it’s expensive (not too bad, about $200), has a pretty big learning curve, and I can’t easily add lines and text when I need to (or maybe I can and don’t know how).

 

 

Here’s Paint.net which is free and I’ve been using it for years. The autocorrect feature is bad though and I never use it. I can add lines, text, and adjust most things easily.

 

 

Original : Canon Software : Lightroom Auto : Lightroom with tweaks : Paint.net

 

Any suggestions? I don’t have time to learn Adobe Photoshop. I want something easy and fast and preferably inexpensive. What do you guys use?

Blog Awards–Thank you Ladies!!!

Hi Ladies! It seems like forever since I’ve posted. I had a lot of fun for Christmas Break and just got back into town a few days ago. We spent two fun weeks in San Diego and the sun and nice weather is what I needed to make it through another dreary winter.

While I was gone, I received a couple of Blogger awards. Ahhhhhh, thanks! I know I’m a much less frequent poster lately and I know my sewing has slowed down quite a bit. Thank you faithful followers! :)

I was awarded the Very Inspired Blogger Award by Andrea and Becky.

The rules for this one:
1. Thank the person who nominated you.
2.  Add The One Lovely Blog Award/Very Inspiring Blogger Award to your post.
3.  Share 7 things about yourself.
4.  Pass the award on to 10 nominees.
5.  Include this set of rules.
6.  Inform your nominees by posting a comment on their blogs.

Seven things about me (I’m also using this to show you new photos – no, I’m still not over how well this new camera takes photos).

1) I’ve always loved photography and it’s really on my mind right now because I was just given a camera for Christmas. It’s a Canon and I think I’m a Canon whore. I had one in college and I loved it. It was film but I had some nice lenses. Unfortunately, my Mr. Wrong decided he needed to keep it and all my stuff when we got divorced.

2) I’m not artistic at all. At. All. Really. People are all like, “Wow! you are so artistic! Look what you can make!” And I’m all like, “Ugh, copying something is not artistic.” My father’s side of the family is very artistic and automatically compose shots using the rule of thirds. Me? No. I can copy something if you show me a design. That’s not being artistic.

3) I’m remarried to a wonderful man. I now know what a marriage is supposed to feel like. Before, it was like two people living their own lives and they just happened to live together. Now, I feel like half of a whole.

4) I love to run. And run and run. There is nothing so freeing as a good hard run. Wind whipping in your ears, hair coming out of the ponytail, legs hurting, and deep ragged breaths. All good stuff.

5) I’m not a big fan of the water. It sort of freaks me out. When I’m on a boat in the ocean, I feel anxious. I usually get over it when I’m fishing and having fun but I think about it all the time when I’m out there.

6) I love Marie Calendar Pot Pies. Love them. I’m weird about them. I’ll wait until I have an afternoon to myself and cook one in the overn (never microwave) and enjoy it by myself. This is super astonishing because I am a very healthy eater. There’s something about the salty goodness, the flaky pastry, and the little bowl that just make me happy.

 

Thank you ladies! Let’s see, who to pick?

1. Amanda’s Adventures in Sewing. She’s so perfect, I hate her. Not really. Well, maybe a tiny bit.
2. Melissa over at Fehr Trade. She’s prolific and awesome.
3. I Wanna Frock and Roll All Night. Love them.
4. J.Kaori Sews. She produces beautiful garments.
5. Love you Kristine!
6. Love Angie too!!!
7. Karen often cracks my shit up. She makes nice stuff too though.
8. Trena over at The Slapdash Sewist always shows the best tutorials on the adjustments she has made.
   

I could probably find two more but these are my favorites. I bought a bunch of fabric down in San Diego so I’ll have to show you soon!

Test Windows Live Writer Post

On my continuing quest to stop using Blogger to upload posts, I have found Windows Live Writer. I have to thank Mimi O and BeanGirl for suggesting it. You can easy add photos and text, change things around without it getting wonky, and the code is actually nice and neat. In Blogger it left bits and pieces of code everywhere which leaves this type-A lady hysterical.

Isn’t my photo pretty? I still have some kinks to work out but so far, so good! You just write in Live Writer, click a button and it uploads it to Blogger. It’s like magic!

Bloglines Closing, What to do???

I don't know how many of you use Bloglines as your RSS feed but they are closing as of October 1st. I've kinda been out of the loop lately as far as blog/RSS/sewing goes so it was kind of a surprise to me. I really like my feeds because it's a fast way for me to check in on my favorite bloggers.

What do you guys use? Do you use a RSS reader still? What are my other options? I like that I can go to one site and read all of my favorites at one stop. I haven't been very good lately at reading other people's blogs but I'm getting to the point where I am ready to start in again. And now Bloglines is closing! Damn them to hell!! Okay, I'm not really that upset but I do want to move my feeds to another place so I don't lose them all.

Fall Wardrobe Plan -- The Real One

Okay, so I'm going to pretend that that other blog post doesn't exist. I may erase it and the last one now that I think I have this new editor figured out a bit. We'll see I guess.

I haven't been doing too much sewing lately. I have all this great fabric and it's just sitting forlorn on a shelf in my sewing room. I'm starting to feel bad for it. I chose a bunch of stuff that kind of goes together and decided that it's time to hop back on this horsey and get riding again. So, we have (r-l) white cotton shirting (hard to see in the lower right), light grey t-shirting, darker grey RPL, dusty rose baby jersey, hot pink baby jersey, rayon slub jersey, matte jersey, crazy purple/black cotton jersey, and wool sweater knit. I have some ideas for some of it but definitely need some basics.

Here are the ones I have sort of figured out. I don't want to restrict myself too much to a plan. I love these 02/2010 #102 pants. I think they'd be great in a dark pinstripe RPL.

The 09/2010 #121 turtleneck would be perfect for these two baby knits. These are part of my recent fabric haul. I love this fabric. I may buy more of it. I can't find the September photos of BurdaStyle magazine online. I can find August and October but September seems to have been eaten by the new Burda website. The bottom one is more of a dusty rose. It's hard to tell the color in this photo.

I absolutely adore this bubble skirt in the 08/2010 edition of Burda. It's for a woven but I'm sure it will be fine in a knit if I reinforce the yoke. I'll use this light grey heathered t-shirt knit.

I think these 04/2010 #119 pants would be great in this grey RPL. This is another fabric from my recent Fabric.com order.

These pants are cute too and I might make them in a thin denim. Haven't decided yet . . .












I also have all this fabric which is unspoken for. I want to use the slub rayon for another simplicity cardigan. I'm not sure about the other fabrics. I'm thinking knit dresses for the purple/black knit and the crazy purple/black/dot fabric. The bottom one is the Slub Rayon Jersey Knit . It's so soft and pretty!!!

Blogger, You Annoy Me.

This is mostly just a test blog entry to see how to format with their new and improved (read: crappy) editor. I do know a bit of HTML so I could format things that way but you would think they would have a good editor. For most of you guys, I would just skip this blog post. I am going to add random photos so see if it works better to add photos after you write. I used to add all my photos first and then add text but that didn't work out so well yesterday.

I need some text and I'm not sure how to fill it up. I don't want to actually put in sewing information because people will actually want to read about it. Instead I'll write about running. I did my third half marathon a month ago. I'm gearing up to do my fourth next month. What's super fun about the one in October? Well, it's a Zombie Half-Marathon. Yes, I said zombie. How much fun will be be to run around with green paint on my face?

Yesterday I ran seven miles in the scorching heat. Well, it wasn't hot but normal standards but this is Alaska. I think it was in the 60s so that is really hot for September in Alaska. Here's the official logo for the Zombie Half-Marathon. There is also a marathon, and the Undead Ultra 50k. I like that it says "Pizza and limbs at the Chalet when you finish." You've got to love funny runners. 

Okay, the damn linkie-links seem to work. I think the key is to do your text first and then add your photos which is completely different that the older Blogger editor.