Vintage Cars and Baby Bumps

Jan 29

Saturday I spent a couple hours running errands. While going down the freeway, I passed this car. I don't know what make or model it is, but it was gorgeous. There was a phone number in the back window, I'm assuming it is a rental for weddings and such. Wouldn't this be the coolest car to leave your wedding in? Especially if you had an awesome vintage/retro theme. I broke all sorts of driving laws to get this picture, but it was totally worth it. Of course, since I was driving, the quality of the photo wasn't that great. It is kind of blurry, and washed out. So I decided it was the perfect candidate for some over-zealous editing. Just having fun =]

Jan 30

Today, Sunday, I decided it was time for another baby bump picture. It's been a few weeks since my last one. Since the sun was actually out today, (a miracle for January in Oregon), I decided to get some sunshine in the picture. I set up the timer on my camera, and used the sunshine from the back porch. I turned off all the other lights in the house, so I could get a good shadow effect. I wanted the focus to be on just my belly. I really like how it turned out, what do you think?

Boys and Their Toys

Hubby has been at the Portland Auto Show all weekend. My hobby is sewing, His hobby is RC cars. We're not talking about the RC cars you buy at the toy store. These are serious hobby cars. They build them from the ground up. He buys the frame, shocks, motor, wheels, body, etc. all separately and assembles a totally custom car. The biggest part of the hobby are the rock crawlers. They have competitions with courses and everything. They even get extra points for any accessories that make them more realistic. The RC rock crawlers club that he is part of, had a booth at the auto show this weekend. They were a huge hit with the crowds. He worked the booth with a few other club members, pulling 14 hour shifts, 4 days in a row. I visited him at the show, but I totally forgot to take any pictures. Doh! I even had my camera with me! So instead I snapped a couple photos of one of his RC cars when we got home.

Jan 28

Jan 28

New Header, Collages, and More

For the last couple weeks, I have been searching online for a good free photo editing program. When I do the We Heart Wednesday posts, I want to display the photos in a fun collage, rather than taking up the whole page by posting each picture individually. I think it's easier on the eyes, don't you? I've also been trying to design a fun header that doesn't take too long to change. I get bored easily, and like to mix it up. Thirdly, I've also been working on making a button, in hopes that you guys would post it on your blogs to help share the love. *Insert cheesy smile here*

Well yesterday I finally found what I was looking for!! Picasa. It's totally free, super easy to use, and it doesn't bog your computer down a whole lot, like PhotoShop and Gimp tend to do. 

To make my header, all I had to do was pick my photos, click the "collage" button, and voila! I chose the polaroid border, and then arranged the photos. Arranging was super easy to, you just drag and drop! If you want them rotated, just click and hold while you move your mouse. Seriously, the easiest photo software that I have ever used. Once I wanted to add the words, I could have done that in Picasa too, but I wanted a fancy font. (Picasa has cool fonts, but I'm picky). So I clicked the "Picnik" button, and voila! I'm editing my photo in Picnik. They have tons and tons of fonts. I typed what I wanted, did a simple drag and drop to put it where I wanted it.. Then I moved the little slider to adjust the size. Click save, and it automatically saves it to my Picasa! Seriously, that is all I had to do. It probably took 20 minutes.

I had so much fun with that, I decided to make a button. Again, I used the collage setting to get my photo in the cute little polaroid frame. Then I added the words in Picnik. I then went back to the collage setting again, to get my green border. And I'm done! When you save your photos, you get to pick what dimensions you want. So I picked 800 pixels for my header, and I got an exact 125x125 pixels for my button. Seriously so easy.

But I'm not going to pretend that I'm super smart here and got this all figured out by myself, because I really didn't. I used these tutorials to help me out:

How to make a Blog Header for Free (Using Picasa)


How to Make Your Own Blog Button (And Add a Scroll Box for the Code)

If you haven't already, grab my button! Help share the love! I have a box over on the far left sidebar, with your buttons in it. If you have mine, and I don't have yours, please let me know! I want to return the favor =]

By the way, I was thinking about making a step by step tutorial, complete with photos, showing how I made my header. If anyone is interested, please tell me!

Wrapping Up the Evening

Monday. Yuck. I've never been a fan of Mondays, but this one was especially icky. After a very long 10 days of being sick, I'm back to work again. I spend 8+ hours every day in front of this keyboard. I guess it could definitely be worse. At least it was a slow week, so I wasn't completely overloaded while also trying to get over the tail end of my cold.

Jan 24

Tuesday morning was absolutely gorgeous! It's been a great week in general. Not much rain, and tons of sunshine. (Well, tons for an Oregon winter anyway.) I snapped this picture while on my way to work. I knew if I waited 1o more minutes until I got to work to take the picture, the colors would be long gone.

Jan 25

Wednesday, January 26th. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOMMY!!!! Hubby and I went to my parents' house after work. My sister made a fabulous steak teriyaki dinner. Soooo good. I ate way more than I should have. After dinner, we had some of Grandma's homemade chocolate cake with some fabulous ice cream. Definitely a good way to wrap up the day.

Jan 26

Thursday. Nothing really fantastic about today. Another slow day at work, napped on the couch when I got home, Hubby is gone until late tonight. Since the beginning of this pregnancy, my biggest side effect/symptom/annoyance has been heartburn. Lots and lots of it. I take Zantac daily for it, but occasionally it still flares up. Another random symptom, I'm no longer lactose intolerant! Weird! So when the heartburn flares up, I nestle on the couch with a big bowl of ice cream. It helps soothe the heartburn, and I can enjoy an extra special treat. Definitely a great way to wrap up my evening.

Jan 27

WHW: Red Shoes

Update: I changed my collage since the original post. I didn't like it, and it was bugging me haha. I just downloaded Picasa today, and it is so incredibly easy to make awesome collages now! I'm having too much fun.

 I once heard someone say that you can never have a bad day when you are wearing red shoes. I have to agree. I only own one pair of red shoes at the moment, but I love them to death. They are a patent leather pair of bright red, peep toe, slingback heels; and they are shmexy. Love love love them.