My first impression was the color was a little darker and more green than I expected.  A little closer to teal than aqua, but still very cute.  The interior is a bright lime green and I like it.  It is a large camera bag with room for a camera, lenses, accessories, items from your purse etc.  The draw back is physics don’t change because the bag is cute.  What do I mean?  Just because I can fit all of these items in my bag (one bag, one bag!) doesn’t make it comfortable or light to carry it.  My canon 40D and 24-70L 2.8 Lens combo are heavy.  I just have to face the facts.  4.25lbs for the camera itself is just going to be heavy no matter what.  Add to that my iTouch, Cell Phone, wallet, lipstick, sunglasses, carkeys, hand sanitizer and those are the bare minimums… and the bag pulls in at 8.5 lbs. I’m not sure what I think about the shoulder strap yet.  While it is more comfortable to use the shoulder strap, I feel like it might look like a poorly packed diaper bag.  I wish the handles on the bag were just a touch longer.  I feel like the bag is too wide in its current configuration to wear the bag on my shoulder with the handles.  I have to reconfigure somehow, but just not sure yet.  I guess what I was (ridiculously) expecting was a little bag like Hermione’s, ha ha wishful thinking!

here are a few shots of how I have it packed for now:

please excuse that dirty mirror, ugh, I have to go clean that now.

So all in all, I am happy with my bag, just not sure how to best pack it for comfort and efficiency.

Other new goodies in our house…

I picked up a kid sized little table and chair last week for Jordan to use for his school work.  Our current dining table is a counter height table and Jalen’s desk is also too tall.  They are just not the right dimensions for Jordan to practice his writing.  So while standing in Fisher trying to decide on one or two chairs, I opted for one.  I brought it home and my Father in Law put it together.  We love it, it’s pretty sturdy and a great work surface for crafts, writing or eating.  But then I started to kick myself for only getting one chair.  We have been using a little step to sit at the table with Jordan but today I gave in and went back for another chair.

here are the two boys eating some star wars shaped peanut butter cookies ;)

We’ve been really busy since Granny and Pop have come to visit.  They just headed back today so I’m catching up on laundry and vacuuming and cleaning up… While straightening up my Mt. St. Scrap aka, my over crowded workspace, I pulled out my scissors.  Now I knew I had quite a few scissors and a few of the same pairs of scissors. but when i saw how many there were, I just had to lay them out and snap a shot.  Is it hoarding or is it preparedness?  whatever the case, look at my scissor arsenal! each type has a specific purpose….

I know, I know, I have issues. ha ha.  You should see how much adhesive I have.

thanks for stopping by, check back next time when I’ll be posting more digital layouts, hybrid projects and Glimmery goodness.

Love Love and Blog you later,

Joscie, rhymes with bossy

I created an 8.5×11 template in CS4 and added guides so the month and day blocks would be 4×4.  I included the numeral, printed and cursive in English and finally in Hawaiian.

I created sheets for each month/day of the week.  I trimmed 1/4″ off each of the long sides, 1/2″ off the top then  2 1/2″ off the bottom.  Then cut the remaining piece into 4×4 pieces.

the number/year pieces were designed to be 2×4 so when I placed a month, day, date, year it would be 12″ and fit perfectly on a 12″ chipboard base.

after trimming all the pieces, I stacked them up and punched with the bind it all and put it all together…

The boys are now learning the date in English and Hawaiian, and I couldn’t be happier! :)
Thanks for stopping by, I have a few more projects in the works!
love Love and Blog you Later!
Joscie, rhymes with bossy

Good Morning! Getting ready for the day, it’s going to be a great one~

and it surely was!  We woke up happy, got breakfast and got Jordan off to school with no problem.  When Jalen and I got home, he started on his book report and I fired up the Google Reader.  What should I see but this post on the Creating Keepsakes Blog. ***:) can you say excited?!  I am so thankful that Megan picked my Home Made Pies layout as her favorite layout of the year!

I also got working on the YUDU for the first time today.  I got ample warning that you must make sure the emulsion sheets are completely dry before continuing on in the process.  I ran it through the dry cycle 3 times and then followed up with my hairdryer.  I am pretty happy with how it turned out.  I printed a few different designs of LOVE and thanks cards.  I love the texture of the ink. love.  Things I didn’t love about the YUDU- the drying time was killing my patience.  The primary colors of ink that I got (UGH- what an ugly red, and I didn’t even try the blue or yellow)  Things I need before my next run: white ink, and maybe silver ink , Neutrals.  I’d also love an aqua colored ink as well- but I don’t like the colors they offer.  I need more transparencies, emulsion, blockout and I’d love another screen.

here are a few of my quick cards from today:

I printed a lot more than these in various colors.  I also screened cutchens.com on the backs of the cards. I love it!  I can’t wait to make more varieties!  the corduroy buttons/brads and cardstock are from stampin up and the flower is making memories.

now you may be thinking, couldn’t she just do that by printing with her printer? yes, I could. but I loved the texture of the ink. and I can’t wait to plan some tshirt and other fabric prints *i just picked up a bunch of tshirts from target!

Today was an early out day for Jordan at Preschool so I got the boys happy meals from McDonald’s.  I found it quite amusing that both boys can identify the golden arches, read the logo… but Jordan pointed out, “that guy looks weird” and I told him, his name is Ronald McDonald.  and he was like, “who?” and even Jalen didn’t know who Ronald McDonald was either.  Today’s picture of the day came after lunch when Jordan put on this hat, he said, ” I look like Bowser’s minion.” ha ha.

here’s who he was talking about:

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you’re having a great day!

Love Love and Blog you Later!

Joscie, rhymes with bossy!

I am so excited to tell you, I got an email today inviting me to be a member of the Two Peas in a Bucket Digital Creative team! :)  Of course, I jumped at the opportunity!

I am committing to the 2010 project 365.  I tried a few years ago, but fell off the wagon.  This year, I am committing to get it done.  It is such a fun way to look back and remember daily activities, to share with our family and it also provides lots of great pictures to scrap!  Are you planning to tackle 365? or 52?

I am also trying to decide on a word for the year, guess I better hurry up and choose!

On Christmas night, Troy and I watched Twilight on iTunes.  I was enthralled.    we both really enjoyed it.  I mean, yes, there were some corny bits- i didn’t like how he ran and climbed the trees- but I really enjoyed it.  I mentioned that New Moon might be available on iTunes soon, but actually, it was still in the theater!  We went on the 26th to see New Moon.  sigh. I loved that too.  So we went back to his mom’s house and I downloaded Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse and Breaking Dawn on the iTouch Kindle App.  I read twilight on Sunday, New Moon on Monday, and on Tuesday while we flew I read Breaking Dawn.  Yep, that’s right. I read book 4 by accident before book 3.  Anyway, I’m currently working my way through Eclipse, and loving it.

I guess that’s about it for now, I must get to work on some scrap, yay!  Thanks for stopping by and I wish you and yours a safe and Happy New Year!

Love Love and blog you again real soon,

Joscie, rhymes with bossy

my Canon 40D

50mm f/1.4

lens hood

black foam or cardstock.

scissors.

• take your cardstock or foam and cut out a circle in the size of the lens hood.
• fold the circle in half and cut out a smallish heart (or other shape) out of the center of the circle.  There are two things to think about when choosing foam vs. cardstock.  The foam is very easy to cut the circle and goes into the lens hood easier, but the center part is harder to cut the shape evenly.
• voila, now you have a bokeh shaper!

• place it into the lens hood, and be sure it’s oriented corectly in relation to your camera (are you shooting portrait or landscape? make sure your hearts will not be sideways)
• You will want to shoot with your aperature as wide as it can go (for my lens, that’s 1.4)
• if you want to shoot with a person in the foreground, space them away from the light source.
• If you are just shooting lights, you’ll want to set your lens to manual focus and blur the lights to get the lovely shapes!

If you do this, please do leave a link so I can see your goodies! :)

The new exhibit was animatronic dinosaurs.  These are always really really cool.  And unfortunately for a family with a four year old, also really really scary.  Look who greeted us at the entrance…

This big guy moved and growled (roared?) but it was quite intimidating.  I had to piggy back Jordan into the building.

we didn’t stay long inside this display, and I didn’t make Jordan look at anything too scary.  There was an excavation area with sand and cast skeletons that was pretty cool, and a bunch of more moving, roaring dinos.  We moved along to the newly unveiled Hawaiian Hall.

The inside of the hall has only minimal artificial lighting and a sign saying no flash photography.  I had carried both my 50mm f1.4 and my 10-22 3.5.  I got a few good shots, using pillars and counters to rest the camera on.

If you live in Hawaii and haven’t been to Bishop Museum in a while, I highly encourage you to make a visit. It is so beautiful!  If you’re coming on vacation to Oahu, this is a must see (along with Polynesian Cultural Center).

For the past year, I’ve been saving up to buy a new computer.  I wanted to buy a mac, but ended up going with a new PC.  This one has 8 Gig of RAM, a 1 Terra-byte hard drive (woo hoo lots of pictures and digi scrap space!) and also has a blue ray player.  It was very affordable, and I’m using my old *(still fabulous) monitor that I got last year.  add to this CS4 and totally rad actions… I have been so happy.  On my old computer, although I had installed 2 additional Gig of RAM, it was only recognizing a little over 3 Gig and CS4 kept crashing every time I’d try to open too many RAW files or run an action.  very frustrating.  so all in all, even though I didn’t get a mac *(or a new lens) I am thrilled with our new puter! yay, yay and double yay.  I am hoping this will lead to better productivity! (read more scrappage, blogging and picture editing!)

Love Love and blog you later! :)

Joscie, rhymes with bossy~

The latest ATC swap I participated in was under the theme of books. I went with the iBook theme:

**i had a shot that was not angled,  but I liked that Jordan is peeking in the back ground. ;)  The cardstock is Stampin’ Up! YoYo Yellow,  I used my handy dandy circle and rectangle punches in my abe lincoln book and created the ipod look. I rounded corners and added glaze with gold pearl ex. and memento ink in canteloupe.  do you see that frog holding my card? I got that in the mail from my pal Chrispea. what a sweetie. She also sent lots of goodies and sweet treats for my boys and I.

and seriously, how cute are those goody boxes! The boys were so excited to see their names on the labels :)  I told them aunty chris(pea) made them especially for them.

I so loved this little envelope of goodness. I mean really. the buttons and keys are so awesome. but even that envelope. sigh, it’s a sickness, this love I have for envelopes and paper. ha.  There were also scrappy goodies I can’t wait to use too. Thank you so much Chris! :)

I have also been loving the Japanese Washi tape you see everywhere.  I have seen these at happytape and digi versions from Danielle Thompson.  I have also seen some plain colors at a local store.  I had already started a collection of these and then saw these stripey and *sigh* graph paper tapes. had.to.buy. here.

Sometime in the last year, adobe offered up an upgrade to CS3 for 299. I really wanted to upgrade. really.  but I also was toying with the idea of getting a mac.  I did not want to buy some expensive software and then end up buying a computer that wouldn’t run it.  So I didn’t buy the upgrade. I was so sad because I didn’t even end up buying the mac.  Then last week I got an email from adobe offering a $299 upgrade to cs4. I jumped on that opportunity. I know I won’t be buying a new computer anytime soon, so I was so glad to have to opportunity come up again.  and then I also heard about crucial.com It is a site where you can go and plug in information about your computer and it will tell you how much RAM you can upgrade to and what type to buy. So happy. I ordered more RAM and my computer is humming along so well! I can now listed to iTunes while I use CS4 and blog and all of that and it doesn’t skip anymore. yay!  These pictures for the blog are the first items I have processed in CS4, nothing fancy, but I am so excited to get into it further. YAY! saying goodbye to these old sticks of 512MB ram.

Thanks for stopping by!  I have been so so busy around here, and I am glad I had some time today to update.  Check back next time and I’ll have stories about my van and other fascinations of our life, ha! Oh yes and two more things: I have a halloween layout in the last issue (October) of Memory Makers Magazine and a layout in the October issue of Creating Keepsakes (eeeeeeeeeee!) I haven’t seen the CK yet, no sightings in the store or mailbox just yet.

Love Love and Blog you Later!

Joscie, rhymes with bossy!

On a happier note, I am so honored to be listed as an SOB ! a successful and outstanding blogger, recognized by Liz Strauss: http://www.successful-blog.com/301-what-is-an-sob/ so exciting! :)

Flat Joscie is visiting my girlfriend Detta in Texas! read about her arrival and her tours on Detta’s blog. :)

Thursday morning was the soft opening of the brand new Lego Store in the Ala Moana Shopping Center. We have been anxiously awaiting it’s arrival!  The signs around the construction area only said coming 2009 but never indicated a date.  Last week we were at Ala Moana and spotted a lady walking into the store and she gave us the heads-up about the Thursday morning opening.  We met up with two girlfriends and their kids and wandered the Lego Wonderland!  There were so many neat displays, and areas for the kids to play with some Legos, a mini figure construction area… and just everything Lego.  Possibly my favorite part was the pick a brick wall in the rear of the store.  There were two sizes of cups, like slurpees, and you could pick the bricks you wanted and fill the cups.  It was crowded and busy, but the workers were all so friendly and helpful, we’ll definitely be back.  We are also excited about the coming monthly FREE kids construction projects where each child can build and take home a Free mini project.  On Thursday afternoon, when Troy got home from work, we headed back down for him to see the store.  I was surprised to see some of the same workers from earlier in the morning still working at such a late hour.

Since Troy is going to be deployed on Jalen’s and My birthday, we decided to splurge on a fancy lunch to celebrate.  Yesterday we went to Tanaka of Tokyo at Ala Moana for lunch.  It is a Japanese restaurant where they prepare the meal on the grill in front of you and perform dazzling, entertaining tricks with spatulas and food.  So much fun.  They even brought Jalen a scoop of Ice Cream with a candle and sang to him :)

and as we were waiting for the check, Jordan says, Mom, look, I’m an ewok! :) ( i know it’s blurry, but I couldn’t resist sharing it anyway!)

Thanks for stopping by!

Love Love and Blog you later!
Joscie, rhymes with bossy

typewriters, telephones, slide viewers, bottles, suitcases, old cameras, yoyo quilts…

and then the part we really went to see… the star wars guys. I thought it was a bit comical that this guy was drinking coffee. like, “see the empire needs caffeine too”…

Jordan was excited to take pictures with these guys, but for some reason, he never wants to look at the camera anymore. Not sure what the deal on that is… here are the boys with some storm troopers.

here they are with Boba Fett, bounty hunter.

and Jalen with another storm trooper.

and to preface this picture, i must say we are a no gun house.  Other than the lego blasters/guns that have just recently entered our home with the Star Wars and Indiana Jones and Agents Lego sets and the Star Wars Action figures, we had no guns in our home.  the closest thing was a dinosaur water gun from Disney World two years ago.  The boys will sometimes construct guns out of Lego blocks, but not when I am looking at them.  I think it’s rude to point a gun at someone and until I think they are old enought to follow that rule… we’ll continue to be a no gun household. now this next picture, I’m framing up the shot and just before I snap it, the guy in the black hands over the blaster to Jalen. and I snap the shot. He hands the blaster back.  Jordan immediately asks why the guy gave it to Jalen. I tell him, well son, I think he didn’t know we’re a no gun family.  but the shot is cute anyway.

We had a fun time at the collectors show!

Love Love and Blog you Later,

Joscie, rhymes with bossy

We had our lunch, Jordan and I shared some char siu bao (Manapua) and rice cake, while Troy and Jalen had Korean food.

I love this shot I got of my cute hubby! :)

Jalen playing Super Mario Brothers…

Some ttv fun:

and Jalen shooting his own photos :)

these were in the window at the Kate Spade store:

Jalen on the Escalator and some mochi in a display at shirokiya.

for the red challenge: both of these shots were inside the Williams Sonoma Store. I was struck by the candy apple red finish and glass bowl!

and this i found utterly comical. would you really wear an apron with a pig on it? hee hee! this is a mannequin in the same store.

and on Sunday, we got to go to a FREE sneak peek on the Marine Base over in Kaneohe. I’ve had that note on a post-it for about a month now, reminding me.  After church on Sunday, we drove over to Kaneohe to get in with 850+ Harry Potter Fans and watch The Half Blood Prince.  We got our seats around noon and had a two hour wait.  No electronic devices allowed inside the theater. No cell phones, no ds, no cameras etc.  They even had a cell phone check, like a coat check, only crazier~!

the movie started at 2 and went for almost 3 hours. I will not spoil anything for anyone, I will just say, it was very nice and familiar. To see the faces of our favorite characters, a little more grown up, and wonderful adventure.  and I loved that they used some of the same music.  You see, we are the type of nerds to buy soundtracks from our favorites like star wars, indiana jones and harry potter and we listen on the ipod in the car. so when the music played in the movie, we all just grinned from ear to ear.  It was a great movie and I can’t wait to watch it again!

check out the cell phone/electronic device check after the movie:

and a blurry picture of the boys next to the signs:

before the movie, during the two hour wait, they did Harry Potter Trivia and Jalen answered a tough question (name the four houses and their mascots) and won mini golf and movie vouchers! I was so proud that he answered the question over the mic so well!

Today we went out shopping for school supplies, and I am so glad and proud and relieved to say, we’re done. We checked everything off the list, including and ukulele ;)  I have to say I was so proud of the boys for behaving so well (we’re all human and not always this lucky) while we ate our lunch, two older ladies came by and complimented the boys for being so well behaved. Yay for them making good choices!  we even celebrated with icees at target when the last bit was completed.

Next weekend I’m doing the Scott Kelby world wide photo walk, right here in Honolulu. Are you participating in your area?  I’d love to hear it. also are you participating in the red photo challenge? let me know!

I am going to figure out what’s for dinner now and I’ll check back with you lovelies later!

Love Love and blog you later!

Joscie, rhymes with bossy