My Sweetest Things

February 2010
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Memory Collage

Posted in Crafts on 02/07/2010 11:39 am by Donna

Throughout our trip to Germany I saved and collected maps, train tickets, coins, and other small paper items for keepsakes. I am working on an album for the photos but was not quite sure what I would do with my collection. I bought a photo box to store them in but then I came across a blog post by A Nerd Like Me. Evan the blog author returned from a trip to Italy and came up with the idea for a memory collage using an unused picture frame. I happen to have a lot of picture frames in closets just because I know I will use them someday and someday finally came, so Saturday afternoon I created a Memory Collage. I love the result!

This picture I have had for years and recently took it down and kept it for the frame. It is gold with a crackly finish and I choose to change up the color of the frame from gold to brown.

I removed the paper lining, the back cover and the glass.

I lightly sanded the frame and applied one coat of Burnt Umber.

While the frame was drying I gathered the items I wanted to use for the collage. I created a small 5×7 picture collage using Picasa and photos from our trip. It is so easy to do and once the collage is created Picasa has a feature where you can send the photo to a local printer. I choose Walgreen’s by our house and one hour and $1.99 later, the photo was ready!

When the frame was dry I arranged the items and glued them on the back cover of the frame. I used a map as the background and glued all the paper items around it. I used hot glue for the coins and coasters.

The final result!

I love it and it makes me smile. It’s nice to glance at it and remember such an incredible trip! Thanks to Evan and visit her site A Nerd Like Me. She is fun and crafty with great ideas to share. I’m starting her Cork Board project today!

It’s all good ~ Donna

Tags: Memory Collage
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Canon Speedlite 430EX II

Posted in Photography on 02/05/2010 11:08 am by Donna

This past Christmas I was very happily surprised with a new toy! A Canon Speedlite 430EX II. I am not a fan of using flash when I take photographs but there are times when setting up the tripod is not an option especially for a quick in home shot. I did some research and heard good things about the 430EX II and maybe said out loud a few times..”I have been looking at camera flashes” and someone (my generous husband) heard me (there must not have been a football game on at the time) and now that baby is in my pretty little hands!

The flash is very easy to add to your camera. It slides right into the shoe on top and locks in place. Of course I did not read the manual, I was anxious to try it so I just turned it on and took a few shots to test it out. Please note that these photos have had no color adjustments made to them. Just a slight sharpen and crop.

This is the first shot. This is Toby and it was DARK in our living room and night outside. No lights on. Pretty Neat Huh?

The 430EX II head can be moved up from 0 – 90° (5 settings), left from 0 – 180° (7 settings) and right from 0 – 90° (4 settings). I turned the flash to face the back wall which is painted a tan color. See how the color changed? Don’t point at tan walls unless you like this color cat.

This shot is taken with the flash turned backwards.

This horrific photo was taken with the flash that is built in my camera. Terrible.

Flash is pointing straight up to the ceiling which is white. Looking Good! Most impressed since there are no lights on and it’s quite dark in the room.

I am very happy with the results! The Speedlite 430EX II is quiet. The recycle time is fast. 20% faster (as compared to the 430EX) and since it is compatible with Canon’s wireless E-TTL, it can be used as an affordable “slave unit”.

Thanks Nitsuj for this wonderful gift of light! (This photo also taken with the flash in dark living room.)

Thanks Toby Cat for being such a sweet model. (Photo taken with flash pointed at tan wall. Beware of tan walls.)

It’s all good. ~Donna

Tags: Canon 430EX II
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How Old Are Your Spices?

Posted in Around the House, Baking on 02/03/2010 06:02 pm by Donna

Over the Holidays I did a whole lot of baking. Spices always show up as an ingredient for a recipe and I happen to have a whole lot of those in my pantry. Pumpkin Pie was on my list of baking goods so I reached in the pantry and pulled out some of my spices. I set them on the counter and thought I had them for awhile so I went to check the expiration dates. To my surprise there was no expiration date listed. Really now? They have to expire don’t they?

These are the spices I pulled out to check. No date on the front.

No date on the back. There is an address though. Like I would write them? Hello. It’s called websites.

On the bottom they have these number and letter codes. No date. No luck. I headed to the McCormick website for information and I found a nifty little spice checker! You can enter the code and then add the city the spice was made in. The address comes in handy after all.

I entered the codes and the city and here is what I found.

This little message. “The 2000 election lasted way too long. Your spices have outstayed their welcome too.” Your Spice was made on 5/4/2000

WHAT?? I was 33 years old when this spice was made? My husband was 20? Weeps. I packed and moved it twice?!

“Hobbits were everywhere and lawyers were blonde. If your spices are from 2002 it’s time to replace them.” Your spice was made on 9/13/2002

I can’t even remember what happened in 2002. Where was I? Who was I?

“Dinosaurs ruled the theater. If you have Jurassic spices then it’s time to make them extinct.” Your spice was made 9/19/1993

In 1993 my youngest son was 2 years old. I stilled lived in Texas. That means this spice was moved across County and State lines into Georgia into 3 different houses! This is bad.

“Baby Doll dresses and clunky shoes use to be a fresh look , but like your old spices, they’ve lost their flavor.” Your spice was made on 11/2/1995

I don’t know which is worse, that I still have the spice or that I still have the clunky shoes?!

This little spice did not have a code on the bottom. Well, thank goodness for that! I get the message. My spices are Expired! It seems I really did not use them very often as some of them were still quite full. They were sitting nice and pretty in the back of the pantry. Just hanging out sharing stories about Elections, Dinosaurs, Blonde Lawyers and High Fashion.

So long my old friends. Thanks for the few good times I enjoyed you. You are expired. Say Goodbye.

It’s all good ~ Donna

P.S.

The lighting in my house is not so great due to the beautiful large trees that surround it. I found a large box, placed a white foam board on it, took a small white box for the background and used a white poster board to reflect the light. I placed this in front of my back living room window and I was very happy with the results! No flash used only natural light with my Canon and 24-70 lens.

Tags: Expired Spices, McCormick Spices
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Marienplatz in Munich, Germany

Posted in Travel Adventures on 02/01/2010 09:52 pm by Donna

I’m Back! Well, I have been back for a week and two days. I’ve been busy catching up on everyday life. Our travel to Germany was an amazing, beautiful experience! I loved every minute of it. I took 1,749 images! It’s difficult to capture the beauty of the places we visited. There is so much feeling behind them. I have been busy editing them for our vacation album. In the next week I will be posting more on the travel experience. Beers, Food, Culture, Hotel and Transportation. Noticed how beer was listed first? I am not much of a beer drinker but German Beers are so tasty! SO TASTY!

We arrived in Munich at 8:30 am Friday, January 15th. We took a train to our hotel and left our luggage since check in was at 3:00pm. We headed out for a walk towards Marienplatz.

We saw many bikes along the way. A popular form of transportation.

The temperatures in Munich were 30-32 degrees during the day. Snow covered the ground and the skies were white. We saw the blue sky only a few times. But we really did not miss it. The change of scenery for us was beautiful!

The New Town Hall (German: Neues Rathaus) is a town hall at the northern part of Marienplatz in Munich, Bavaria, Germany. The city government including the city council, offices of the mayors and part of the administration are located here. It was built between 1867 and 1908 by Georg von Hauberrisser in a Gothic Revival architecture style. It has 400 rooms.

This spiral staircase leads to the different office floors.

The details in the building of the Neues Rathaus are magnificent! This photo was taken inside the inner courtyard.

The Glockenspiel is located in the middle of the clock tower of Neues Rathaus. At 12pm it sprang to life and more than 40 bells started ringing. The top level shows a French jouster fighting a Bavarian one. This is a reenactment of the tournament held in 1568 for the wedding of Duke Wilhelm V and Renata von Lorraine. Below that is “Schäfflertanz”, a jig traditionally performed by Munich’s red-coated coopers which commemorates the end of the plague in 1517.

You will see many people starting to gather and stand around looking up at the clock and waiting. It was awesome to see the movements and hear the bells ring!

Below is a short video clip I took using my point and shoot. I am no Videographer as you will see in the camera shake!

Inside Neues Rathaus is an elevator to a viewing platform. There is a small charge to ride the elevator. (1-2 Euros) The views of the city are beautiful!

Marienplatz was lovely and a great start to our journey. More to come soon!

It’s all good. ~Donna

Tags: Glockenspiel, Marienplatz, Munich, Neues Rathaus
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I’m leaving on a Jet Plane

Posted in Travel Adventures on 01/14/2010 09:53 am by Donna

All my bags are packed and I am ready to go. Today I leave for 10 days to Germany and Austria! I am beyond thrilled! It has been a dream that’s about to come true!

Planes, trains, and automobiles. I will be keeping a journal of my adventures and will have lots to blog about when I return.

Of course this baby is coming with me! I bought a new 32gb card to go along with the 4gb I already have.

See ya later USA! It’s all good. ~Donna

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Textures

Posted in Photography on 01/13/2010 08:00 am by Donna

I learned a new trick this past weekend! I have been interested in learning how to add textures to photographs. I have photoshop and lightroom and I know the very basics of each. I spend time searching the internet and reading blogs to learn new skills. There are so many wonderful talented people who are so creative and gracious!

I have been a fan of the Coffee Shop blog and have been following it for months. Rita is a Texas gal who loves photography and shares many wonderful photo editing tips. She has a great site full of information for folks interested in photography. She had a blog post featuring ShadowHouse Creations. Now Jerry Jones is all about creating beautiful textures and art images. You need to stop by his site and take a look. So inspiring and just what I am interested in.

After trial and error I figured out how to add textures to my images!

Before

After!

The change is very subtle but I really love it and I am glad I tried.

How did I do it? Well, I downloaded the Elemental Grunge Texture Pack and created a file for it.

Once in photoshop I went into the file I created for the textures and I chose a texture I wanted to work with.

I opened up the texture in photoshop then went to my photos and selected one I wanted to try a texture with.

I opened that photo into photoshop so I could see both the photo and the texture. I used the rectangle tool and

copied the texture. I then pasted the texture over my photo. At that point I could see the texture over the

the photo. I then had to right click on the photo with the texture and then I had the option to free transform to pull the texture to cover the entire photo.

After the entire photo was covered in the texture I double clicked the photo to set the texture. I went over to layers and and chose overlay and adjusted

the opacity until I was happy with the result. Whew! I did it! So can you!

I am having fun with textures and thanks again to Rita and Jerry for sharing their beautiful designs with us!

It’s all good. ~Donna

Tags: Adding Textures to Photos
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Atlanta Snow Day

Posted in Around the House on 01/12/2010 10:46 am by Donna

We have seen some record low temperatures here in Atlanta the last week. Waking up to wind chills of 0 degrees. What? The slightest hint of snowfall and the grocery stores are packed and milk and bread are emptied off the shelves. Throw some eggs in there and make French Toast I suppose. Thursday night the sleet and snow flurries started to fall. So pretty and I enjoyed every minute of it since we don’t see that very often. Friday morning I was up early to check on school closings and lucky for my son they were closed. I called my office and sure enough we also had a stay home day. I enjoyed hot coffee from the comfort of my sofa and watched the news and listened to stories of cars sliding on the ice and a 27 car pile up.

When the sun started to rise I geared up in my winter wear and headed out to take a peek.

This is what snow day looked like at my house. Snow dusting. Ice was the problem on our neighborhood streets.

On any other snow day I might have had photos of the family playing in the snow. My Andrew slept all morning

and Justin and the cats and dog were all warm inside the house.

This was Snow Day January 2008! Now that was some snow fun!

Anyhoo, thank you for Snow Day 2010. We all were safe and warm

and well rested!

It’s all good. ~ Donna

Tags: Atlanta Snow Day 2010
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Brownie Pops!

Posted in Baking on 01/11/2010 11:44 am by Donna

Jo-Ann’s fabrics and crafts is one of my favorites places to browse around on the weekends. Crafting has always been one of my hobbies and this store is to me what a candy store use to be. My eyes grow wide and I get just a little excited. So many colorful fabrics and craft ideas to choose from! On one of my Jo-Ann’s trips I came across a brownie pop mold at a super price so I picked it up and decided to give brownie pops a try. I used a brownie recipe that I found from My Baking Addiction’s Blog. Jamie has a wonderful site full of pretty photos and yummy desserts. Hop on over there and take a peek!

The brownies were so moist and delicious! I did have a mishap with the mold. This was my first time using a silicone mold and I thought they were just magical so I did not spray the mold with non stick spray. Well, I had to fight the brownies to get them out! It wasn’t a total loss since brownie crumbs are so tasty so they did not go to waste but ended up as an ice-cream topping. The second batch I used my favorite Baker’s Joy spray and out they popped with no trouble at all. I am a huge fan of Ghirardelli Chocolate and I had picked up the candy making and dipping bar at Sam’s Club so I used that to dip the brownie pops in. Oh so good! But wait! Even better…I had Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups on hand so I chopped those up in the food processor and used that for the topping. Double Whammy of Goodness!

Double Chocolate Brownies from My Baking Addiction

Ingredients

1/2 cup white sugar
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons water
1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup mini chocolate chips – These you fold into the batter before baking.

Combine butter, sugar and water and cook over medium heat until boiling. Remove from heat and add chocolate chips, stir

until melted and chocolate is smooth. Mix in the eggs and vanilla. Combine the flour, baking soda and salt into the chocolate mixture

and toss in those extra chocolate chips.

Spoon the brownie mixture into the mold just below the second rim line.

I baked these at 350 degrees and checked them at 15 minutes and they were perfectly done.

Well, perfectly done and then this happened! They would not come out!

Baker’s Joy to the rescue!

Perfect Pops!

For the chocolate dip, I started with 4 squares of chocolate which I heated in a small glass bowl in the microwave for 30 second intervals until melted.

I chopped up those Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups into small crumbles.

I used lollipop sticks (which you can find find at Jo-Ann’s or Michael’s) and I put a lollipop stick right in the

middle of the brownie pop and dipped it into the chocolate goodness.

Then the above happened. It fell right off the stick! What to do?! Eat it? That would be instant gratification and it was delish,

but these were meant to be shared so I tried again. I started by dipping the stick in the chocolate first then inserted it into the brownie then placed

it in the fridge for a few minutes to set. When I took them out of the fridge I dipped them in the chocolate and then sprinkled the

Reese’s Crumbs on top and I was good to go!

All done! I used a styrofoam ball that I cut in half and stuck the brownie pops in the foam to hold them for serving.

Whew! Loved them! It’s all good. ~Donna

Tags: Brownie Pops, Wilton Brownie Mold
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Monkey Business

Posted in Crafts on 01/10/2010 10:45 am by Donna

Two very special ladies in my life, my Mom and Grandma celebrated their birthday’s and I wanted to give them something special. Molly Monkey is the cutest and I thought she would make both of them smile. Larissa is an Atlanta peep with a wonderful blog mmmcrafts. I made my first Molly in August 2009. You can take a peek here to see how I made her. She received many oohhhs, and ahhhs from family members and I have many more Molly’s in my future. Thanks Larissa for sharing her as she has brought many smiles to our family.

My Molly in the Middle. Grandma’s on left, Mom’s on right. All sitting pretty!

Molly in Grandma’s arms.

Happy 80th Birthday Grandma! You are so wonderful and I am blessed to have you in my life.

I have to mention that the red beaded necklace she is wearing belonged to her mom. She shared a story of how her mom

would get dressed to go to the city and she would wear that necklace. Love, love.

It’s all good. ~Donna

Tags: Molly Monkey
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Georgia Frontiers Horseback Riding

Posted in Travel Adventures on 01/09/2010 10:00 am by Donna

My husband and I had a different start to our normal Christmas Eve. We went to Georgia Frontiers in Canton, Georgia for horseback riding! It was so nice to drive the hour up there. The Holidays are always so hectic so this was a relaxing change of pace. Roger the owner welcomed us and introduced our Horses, Chey and Montego. They were the sweetest! I have been horseback riding a few times and was so looking forward to hitting the trail. It was a cool morning and the Georgia Mountain views were a real treat! We enjoyed talking to Roger along the trail and he had great things to share with us. I learned that Horses have a small stomach for their size, which limits the amount of feed that can be taken in at one time. It is better for them to have smaller meals several times a day instead of one or two large meals since they empty their stomachs when it is two-thirds full, whether the food in the stomach is processed or not. This is why people say “He eats like a Horse” when someone is hungry and eats all day. This is also why Horses have so many bathroom breaks!

Our ride was a little over an hour and Roger took us off onto a new trail he is clearing. I attempted to “run” the horse which lasted a whole 10 seconds at most. I had my heels pointed up, leaned back and held onto the reins just like I was supposed to but it felt like I was going to bounce right off! Roger asked me to not yell like a girl if I needed to stop and for me to say Whoa if I needed to stop. Um. WHOA! My heart was racing but it felt good. I tried to run the Horse a second time for another whole 10 seconds then another WHOA! Great fun but perhaps velcro is in order next time to keep my behind from bouncing off! I highly recommend visiting Georgia Frontiers ! It was a wonderful experience and I am looking forward to our next ride!