Playing with photo editing

I have been very busy the last few weeks and finding time to give you something you might remotely want to read about has been difficult. I decided to share a couple images I have from the beach. I love taking photographs but with digital I love turning them into art! Using Photoshop or other photo editing programs really lets your inner artist come to life. With the 2 images here you can see the different feel you can give an image with different effects.

Surfer Dude

Passages

The problem is deciding which effect you like the best! I will share more beach images in the next few days before summer is over. Hope they inspire you to take a deep breath and relax a bit!

Cold Brewed Coffee

My Guilty Pleasure! Yum, Mocha's
I love mocha's but in the summer it is to hot for me to drink hot drinks. I have just not been able to "warm" to that idea. So iced coffee was a great discovery for me. Then I truly became a coffee snob when our local coffee shop started offering "Cold-Brewed" coffee. It was soooo good! I looked it up on the Internet and found my favorite toy. The Toddy. This is the Toddy. They are offered at Borders bookstores, Seattle's Best coffee shops, on line and I'm sure other places. I started using Seattle's Best Saturdays blend but have tried their Beach house blend for my past 3 batches and it makes a good cup also.

Now these are the next necessities. Your milk, or half and half, (which Land o Lakes has great fat free half and half) chocolate and a mug. Getting the right mix is not an exact science. It depends on your taste, the size of your mug and whether you use milk or half and half. So here is the basic simple steps to a great cold cup of coffee.

Open up you Lb of coffee.

Take a few minutes to sniff that wonderful aroma!

I have a hard time getting past this step!

I did not stick my face in the bag, the blue around

my mouth is reflection off the bag.

Get out your grinder and grind up that coffee!

My kitchen smells like heaven. (Will there be coffee in heaven? I sure hope so.

Any way after you have it all ground you will put it into the Toddy.

Sorry about the out of focus image but can't you just imagine that wonderful smell!!! Go ahead put your nose right up there and close your eyes and breath in. Nothing? Well where is your imagination?

Now you add 4 cups of cold water slowly. Let stand for 5 minutes and add 5 more cups. Make sure all grounds are wet. Then I cover with a plate and let it sit overnight or 12 hours. Sorry I forgot to tell you, you do have to plan ahead. When you make your last cup, mix up the next batch so the next day you are ready to go. This is what it will look like after you add the water.

Now you don't usually have to give me an excuse to buy cute antiques. When I found these adorable small spoons I knew what I was going to do with them. Perfect for stirring my coffee! Aren't they beautiful? It's all about the experience as well as the taste :)

What comes out of your Toddy is a very concentrated mixture that you will keep in the carafe in the frig for up to 2 weeks.

I usually put equal amounts of coffee and half and half then add liquid chocolate (hold over mug, squeeze for a count of um... 6 to 8. depends on how fast you count. lol) then stir. Add water, taste then add water till the taste is good to you. For me it's half mixture and half water. Again it depends on the size of your mug and your personal taste.

The final product! Yum, Miranda just finished baking fresh blueberry scones so I feel a cup of freshly made Cold-pressed coffee calling me. Have a great day!

Love

My Daughter is in love!

This car is sitting at the end of our street and she WANTS IT!!!!!

isn't it cute?

Wouldn't she be sooooo cute in it?

The Problem

Historical liscens. I guess in Ohio, if you have a car registered as historical you can only drive it on a limited basis. Do you think anyone would really know??? Maybe the neighbors, who would see her leave everyday (sometimes 2 or 3 times a day). Anyway, just look at her and tell me this is not the car for her.

She's got style!

Being Crafty

Sometimes I get inspired to sew. It's not often I act on this inspiration because this is not something I enjoy - at all. But when I am in a fabric store or around quilting I just get so excited by all the patterns and colors of the fabrics that I just want to make something from them! Because of this NEED to have the fabric, with good intentions of making something, REAL SOON. I have begun to have a collection of fabrics that is just taking up space and right now in this economy a waste of my hard earned money. So I decided that I REALLY DID NEED to do something with this fabric for it to earn it's keep. So I put together the elements above and came up with what I think are the cutest little pillows. I call them Scrappy Pillows since they are made from scraps of planned but not made quilts, some iron on elements I have and old buttons of my Mothers. I just love them!
Aren't they cute. They measure about 6x6 (I think) right now as I type they are in my husbands frameshop downtown waiting for a home. So I can't measure them and because I made them up I don't remember what I did. I am charging $10.00 each. Because I have become discouraged with my Etsy shop I haven't taken the time to photograph all of them and paid to post them there. If you know of anyone who might like these cuties please have them look here at my blog. I'll be glad to photograph all of them and post them here if anyone is interested. I do have other pillows I made of other beautiful fabrics, I had to have, on my Etsy shop.

I have more fabric and may get inspired to start again but I am recovering from the trauma of watching my daughter finish her 4H sewing project and just looking at that machine gives me the creeps. My friend Julia suggested I blog my experience. Well I am still traumatized, she had judging last week and she models August 4th. By then I will be over it and then I will blog the whole story but I need to find out the ending first. I want to give you all 2 blogs to check out. I missed participating in the Girls Night Out this week but for next weeks fun go to http://rdgirlsnightout.blogspot.com/ you have a chance to win prizes! And for a great time (like you see written on the bathroom wall) you have to go visit http://mizjuneytalks.blogspot.com/ She is my twin sister. We were separated at birth and we found each other blogging! That's my story anyway but I love this lady and her blog is a hoot! Well I'd like to say I'll have a new blog in a few days but that may not happen but I will be blogging about Miranda's dress after Aug. 4th so stay tuned!

Girls Night out in Paris!

Wow what a wonderful Girls Night Out in Paris! Thanks to Dee at Runako Designs. I loved the Spa the best! Thought I'd share some of the great food in Paris.

Sweets, Yum!!!

Thought I'd bring you a bit of culture. It can't be all about the food!

Now go visit Dee's blog http://rdgirlsnightout.blogspot.com and leave a comment and enter to win some of her beautiful jewelry. Ya gotta do it today for this prise go around but Keep visiting her blog for the next "Girls Night Out"!

Saturday drive

This last Saturday our friends took us out for my husbands 50th birthday dinner. I'm just going to move on past the age reference here...So I thought it would be fun to take a (Sunday Drive) on Saturday and go to a little restraunt that has been a popular spot for the Clooney's, as in George and his family, for years. In order to get over to the Kentucky side we take a ferry. Our friends had never done this before so that was fun to share. Augusta is a very small town with a lot of character!

After dinner at the Beehive we walked around the town, had ice cream, sat by the Ohio River relaxing and then headed home. There is one thing to be said for turning 50. Our kids are grown and we can actually have a day in which relaxing is possible.

Come Walk With Me

Since I share about my walks with Cooper so much, I thought I share the woods behind my home where I do most of my walking with Cooper. If we go at the right time and the golfers are gone this time of year we will also walk on the golf course. I will share photos from there another time. So sit back relax and enjoy a wonderful stroll through my woods.

This is the path behind my house that connects to the entrance into the woods. Unfortunately, I can't cut through our yard to this path right now because it is full of poison ivy! I barrow my neighbors backyard in the summer to cut across.

Entrance into the woods on the way to the meadow. Isn't this a beautiful site? These trees have to be 30 ft tall.

further on the path to the meadow.

The meadow. There are 2 paths off to the right you can take or we go forward to the other end and left and it opens into the golf course.

Honeysuckle abounds here!

Deer path off to the side.

Side path

Pretty flowers (weeds)

Trees. Love the texture here.

Cooper running through the high grass.

For comic relief I thought I'd include what I am usually looking at!

Wild Phlox are my favorite! I hope you enjoyed your walk today. Have a wonderful Sunday!