The Story of My Life

I am all about pictures. Obviously, Huh. I have done some neat things with my own pictures and with my students that I want to share. Kinda a tech review. I have already told you about where I order my prints, Mpix .com, the greatest photo lab on the planet. I discovered a few programs and websites lately that are really cool tools that I want to share with you as well. I did a portrait of each one of my students, on a brick wall at the school. We took those portraits and used Picnik .com photo editing website. There are easy touch ups, amazing filters (effects), text, stickers, collages, cards....all that you can used for the most part, FREE and WITHOUT registering. Just upload, edit, download, print or share. You can choose the Premium membership (29.99 for the year, reasonable, really) to access some extra special features, but most of the necessary tools and lots of cool effects are free. You can also access your Facebook , Picasa Web Albums and many other services where you m...

I have loved photography forever. Hard to tell, huh? I just really got into it when I had children, of course. Then I really became interested in learning and getting better at it when the world went digital. I was the yearbook sponsor at Boaz High School and our reigning photographer was the great Bentley Gray. I had been toying with Photoshop and taking pictures, but he provided the yearbook staff with a digital SLR camera that was 6 mega pixels. I did not realize the differences this would make....and since that time I have gone crazy with photographs. He gave me a few pointers on choosing my camera, a lot of helpful hints on Photoshop- and a lot of inspiration. (Check him out..........) My dream is to open my own studio one day- a design studio with photography and all sorts of other fun stuff. But that is not what this post is about........ I take hundreds of pictures. Literally. Probably just about every day. I pick out the ones I want to order and get prints and organize and ...

July is National Cellphone Courtesy Month - an event Jacqueline Whitmore founded with the intent to encourage the increasingly unmindful corps of cellphone users to be more respectful of their surroundings by using some simple cellphone etiquette principles. Let your voicemail take your calls when you’re in meetings, courtrooms, restaurants or other busy areas. If you must speak to the caller, use the e-mail or text messaging feature or excuse yourself and find a secluded area.Send a message. Speak in your regular conversational tone and don’t display anger during a public call. Speaking loudly or showing emotion may distract those around you. avoid CELL YELL. Use your vibrate function or turn off your phone in public places such as movie theaters, religious services, restaurants, etc. Many wireless phones now have environmental settings that automatically adjust the phone and its features so you do not disrupt your surroundings. If you are expecting a call that can’t be postponed, ale...

For years, have used this handy-dandy website to check out emails that I got that sounded too good- or too bad-- to be true. Touted as an urban legend site, one can use this to research any email forward you get that you want to see if it is true, false. Since this site also discusses many items that do not fit the traditional definition of "urban legend" (e.g., trivia, rumors, hoaxes, common misconceptions, odd facts), one single rating system must be able to classify various types of entries". .... As a result, the colored bullets SNOPES uses to classify items have slightly different meanings depending upon the nature of the entries being rated. Below are expansive definitions of the colors' meanings taken form the Snopes website. White bullets are the ones most commonly associated with "pure" urban legends — entries that describe plausible events so general that they could have happened to someone, somewhere, at some time, and are therefore essentially...

I posted briefly a few weeks ago about my new toy, the Blackberry. I promised a full review- so here we go. I chose the Blackberry 8130- The Pearl. In stunning red. It is small but powerful. This will not be a really technical review, just a listing of all the cool features and playthings I have access to! Email and Internet: I get my email from any account I want- and it was the easiest thing to set up that I have ever done. The Blackberry server handles all the technicalities and all you have to do is put in your email address and password- no servers, no outgoing mail issues- nothing! (Unlike the Moto Q that my husband got- we worked for 3 days, literally three days ....to get his mail to send from his cell from our home email account.....and after I finally made it work, he took the thing back!!!!! But hey, I do know how to do it now! And BTW, he purchased the Blackberry World Edition instead and could not be happier.....again, such easy setup.) I get all my blog comments and other...

I am a techie. Sounds better than computer nerd. I have resisted the smart phone/blackberry thing. Until now. We were immersed in buying the family new cells last weekend . I AM SO happy with my choice. And can see why they are called Crackberries . 1 week in Blackberry land and I am SOOOOO happy!!!!! Oh yes, have I mentioned that I am obsessive compulsive already? You can hook up your blackberry to your computer. Download the photos you want from your thousands to choose from. Then have a picture, photoshopped and vignetted, that comes up according to your caller! Make ringtones from your favorite Bon Jovi songs. Assign your favorite Bon Jovi songs to the pictures and the person calling according to which song reminds you of them...... AND the list goes on. My husband chose another phone (Moto Q)and after tinkering with it for the weekend, we returned it for a Blackberry product as well. Mine is so easy to set up and customize. A full review of My phone, His phone he returned...