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Sunday Update

February 26, 2012 at 12:24 pm by Claudia

The winds were howling all day yesterday and through the night. We’re always left with an unsettled, edgy feeling when that happens. I was crossing my fingers that the willow would survive the winds until it can be taken down properly on Tuesday. It did.

I caught these two snoozing on the loveseat:

Ssh! Don’t tell Don I posted this!

Don was taking a nap under what he calls his ‘sleeping bag’ – in reality, a down jacket.

Scout looks cozy, doesn’t she?

I think they’re adorable, but then again, I might be a wee bit biased. Riley was in the den with me.

It’s sunny and cold today and the wind has stopped. I have more crocheting to do for the shop. Speaking of the shop, I listed these two scarves this morning (update: sold):

I’m starting a new one in silk and bamboo:

It will be awfully pretty in this color – sort of a wine or burgundy. By the way, your order comes with one of my little business cards (like the one above) tucked in the wrapping. You can have your very own “Sheep with a Party Hat!”

Have a great Sunday.

Blogging Tips: Making a Banner in Picnik

February 25, 2012 at 12:46 pm by Claudia

Picnik is no more, but making banners in PicMonkey works much the same way. Ribbet is virtually the same as Picnik.

I had a request from Jennifer for a tutorial on making a banner using Picnik. Since Google has decided to close our beloved Picnik in April, many bloggers are creating banners using the collage tool and stockpiling them for the future. Good idea!

I will base this tutorial on the way in which I’ve created mine. If you, dear readers, have additional tips, please share them with us in the comments section. Sorry for the somewhat blurry photos – they are screenshots and this is as sharp as I could make them.

The first thing to do is to go to Picnik, upload and edit the photos you want to use in your banner. In my case, I chose 4 photos that were vertical, rather than horizontal (or landscape) size, because that’s the shape I wanted in my collage. You can use whatever size you want. Crop your photos and do whatever color editing you want at this point because once you upload them into the collage, you won’t be able to edit them individually any more. I edit the photos, save them on my desktop and leave the last edited photo on Picnik as I go to Library.

Click on the Library tab and then click on Start (on the left.) You’ll see these options. Click on Make a Collage.

This screen will appear. On the left you will see various shapes and configurations for your collage/banner. Choose your option. I chose the series of 4 photos at the bottom of the second column.

And this is what came up on the screen. In the lower left hand corner of the screen is the Picnik Basket. You can see that the last photo I edited before moving on to Collage is there. Drag it to one of the 4 openings. When you do this, you can use your mouse to zero in on the area of the photo you want in the frame.

Then upload your next photo by clicking on Upload a Photo.

At this point, I’ve added 2 photos to my collage. I did this in a hurry, so I didn’t do as much playing around with each photo in its frame as I would do normally.

Okay. All four photos have been added. Now I want to play with the color of the border. I don’t want a black border, so I’m going to go over to the left and play around in this area:

By clicking on the color box, another box will appear with all sorts of color options. I chose white. By playing with the slide on Spacing and Proportions, I can control just how wide the border is and the eventual size of the banner. I want something rectangular that won’t take up too much space at the top of my blog. I don’t want my banner as tall as the photos are in the above screenshot, so I will play with all of this until I come up with:

When you’ve come up with something that you like, go to the upper right hand corner and click Done. You will be taken back to the Edit. At this point you can click save and leave Picnik, or do as I did and add a frame to your collage.

Explore all the options. I used the Drop Shadowframe. If you click on Drop Shadow, you can control the color and depth of the shadow in the box that comes up at the left.

There’s my first Drop Shadow. I, however, like two Drop Shadow frames, so I’m going to click Drop Shadow one more time.

Now I have two. I like to have some white space to use when adding text. If you want to add text, my advice is to save the collage as is to your computer first. That way you have the original in case you want to go back and change the text at some point. So, save the collage to your desktop. It will most likely save it as PicnikCollage.jpeg. Note the dimensions below. If these are too big for your banner space, go back into Edit mode and resize your banner.

Then go back into Picnik, upload your collage and add text.

I’m playing with the font. (What else is new? I’m font-crazy.)

And here’s what I came up with. Now I’ll save it again. This time I’ll save it as PicnikCollage1.jpeg. Adding another character will save it as a new collage. Therefore, your original collage will remain intact on your desktop.

Some of you might want to add your text via another photo editor – Photoshop, Photoscape or something else. If that’s the case, you can ignore this last step and upload your collage/banner to the other editor and add your text there.

I went to Pixlr and added text – they have a lot more font options available:

I hope this is useful for you. Now is the time, if there ever was one, to make a lot of banners for the future.

I still can’t believe Picnik is closing. I’m in mourning.

Topsy-Turvy

February 24, 2012 at 9:25 am by Claudia

We took a little walk on the Rail Trail on Wednesday. This one was longer – about 3 miles. It was a sunny, spring-like day. Very quickly, we shed our coats, happily basking in the warmth of the sun. We marveled that all this was happening on a day in February. In the northeast.

The sky was gorgeous. If you look in the upper-right hand corner of the photo, there is an opening in the clouds. I keep seeing the shape of a bird. What do you see?

Our mountain ridge is in the background. I call it ‘ours.’ I suppose everyone around here does. This is the same ridge that we can see from our house. Whenever we take these walks, we are reminded once again that we live in a beautiful part of the country.

So on we walked, talking about the warm weather, thinking that, most assuredly, spring is around the corner. Yes, it can only be a week or so away.

I woke up this morning to this:

What????

I went to bed last night with not a flake in sight. A few short hours later, there is heavy, wet snow everywhere. Look how our chicken wire corral fence is sagging under the wet snow. There’s not a whole lot of it and I suspect it will melt rather quickly.

What a strange winter this has been. Everything is topsy-turvy. (Another old fashioned word that I love.)

I wrote the other day about being in my fifties and feeling young and vital.

I’ve suddenly begun getting emails from the Scooter Store.

Back off, Scooter Store. I’m not ready for you yet.

The willow tree is coming down on Tuesday. Can’t think about it. I will be somewhere else that day, trying to forget what is happening to my favorite tree. I’m sorry, willow. I love you. But your beauty comes with a price. You are too destructive. We have to let you go.

I’ll have some shop updates over the weekend, so be sure to check in!

Have a wonderful Friday.

Sunday Update

Blogging Tips: Making a Banner in Picnik

Topsy-Turvy

Lambs Like to Party

A Note

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