Sunday 1 February 2009

I've been Playing...

Okay, so I know I told you earlier that I was set to have chore filled day! Well, not all the chores happened 'cos Jack decided to push off to the beach with his mates, so bang went my redecorating project in his room. Yesterday was the major clean-out. Today we were going to put up the balance of his pictures (they've been languishing in the bottom of his wardrobe for the last year) & attach the rest of his VAST collection of MUFC posters.

Now my boy is exhausted, over "tanned" & recovering from a host of blue-bottle stings...While he was doing the above (he calls it fun...) I was creating a little memoir of my boy at 13. I got the idea of printing "long & thin" from Ali Edward's latest heart layout (featured in one of my recent posts) & I LOVE how this has turned out.

Ain't she sweet? I've been dying to take this series of photos with Camryn blowing bubbles, before she got too old & it looked babyish. Here she is at 8, looking as carefree as she really is...My Picasa is overloaded with images so I am having to use my daughter's (Chelsea's) & transfer the donkey cart method (via the memory stick) so it is tedious. I desaturated the photos a fair bit, to give them a gentler look. I'm doing this alot at the moment. It calms the colours down a bit as we are at the beginning of a fierce summer here, with temperatures in the high 30's, so the sun is giving everything a rather garish glow.


Here's Chelsea, looking gorgeous at 15. The umbrella is actually BRIGHT red so I did the same thing here & desaturated quite a bit. She also ended up with auburn hair, which delighted her, as it is more like mousy brown in real life & she's not allowed to dye it (school rules).



And now, for the Piece de Resistance! My double page layout photos of our Year in Review Layout for 2008. This took AGES because it meant trawling through ALL my folders from last year, to select roughly 50 images that held a lot of meaning for us, & epitomised the year so to speak. Of course, as usual, I created a collage in Picasa. I just LOVE this function & can't get enough of it at the moment. It was pretty tough trying to condense a year into a layout, hence it HAD to be a double one to contain 6 people's highlights...


Obviously one has to edit all the photos before creating the collage, so it is ultra time-consuming. I have started using the grid function quite a lot now. It creates the white lines between the images & you literally drag it to get the size that you want. This way you also get a white border around the entire collage, which saves mounting it & also kinda pulls it altogether. Despite the "work" it was thoroughly enjoyable & we have all been having a good giggle as we reminisce over the last year, now that it is already February!!!

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

wow - I love it, all of it! Well done you! I also love picassa! It's fab! Thanks for all your helpful information today! I have managed to start on a blog roll, but still need help with displaying the awards! may just drop your friend Jackie a line... thx again!

Vicki said...

Obviously there is a lot more to Picasa than what I have been doing with it. Great idea for the collage for the year in review. Might have to have a play myself.

Cindy said...

Helen, great photos of your kids, they are gorgeous and great tip about desaturating the pics. I love the year in review layout.

Anonymous said...

Well lots of good reading here. ALL the pics are fabulous - love the one of the girls blowing bubbles; and yes, the desaturation thing does look very good, must give it a go ... Big congrats for making it onto another design team.WTG! and have to agree your STYLISH award is very nice!!

Jenny said...

Fantastic - well done on getting onto another DT. And I love your collage. I think I need to give Picassa another go

Anonymous said...

May I say 'thrill buneey' your kids are GORGEOUS!!

Desire Fourie said...

Love the collages you did. A lot of elbow grease definitely went into them. Also thanks for sharing your new map widget ... very interesting. You can really be a proud Mom with such gorgeous children. Also congrats on making another DT ... way to go with that new years resolution. Hugs from Desire

Anonymous said...

Blog is looking gorgeous! Thanks for coffee this morning, it was so nice to catch up!J

Jacqui said...

TESTING TESTING Can't believe it but it looks like I can once again post a comment without using anon!!! Really hope it works as I havn't bothered cos of the anon thing but if this works all the time I'll post regularly. J

Jacqui said...

Wow!!! We are SO honoured to be included in your beautiful collage! Thank you so much my friend, J

Jenny in Durbs said...

Absolutely fabulous !!! You are one talented lady. Congrats on the new design team, you really deserve it. Your collages are stunning what super photos & your children are gorgeous.Have a great week.