Archive for the ‘Tools and Technology’ Category

My Wordpress blog got a virus last July and I spent two months working with my then hosting provider to resolve the situation. They finally washed their hands of the situation and said I needed to get help from the Wordpress forum. Well that did not go anywhere either. So, my blog sat stagnant for the fourth quarter of 2009 while I mustered the energy to rebuild.

From September through December I was working on a contract basis doing strategic marketing for GoAnyware which left me with very little spare time. They are giving me a break in January and I expect it to pick back up in February. So, I decided January would be the month to rebuild my blog (post by post and picture by picture…ugh) and launch my website. I’ll also go ahead and backdate some posts with work I shared on Facebook during my technical difficulties.

I used a great little application called “Artisteer” to create my Wordpress theme. It was very easy. I’d highly recommend it.

I also decided to try using Joomla for my main site. Call me brave or call me naive. It has been a bit more challenging so if you go to my main domain (please don’t) then you will see a mess right now. I’ll be getting back to that next. I might even get started this afternoon!

I’m thrilled to be able to get back to blogging in 2010….Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from our house to yours…these are just mailing today!

The kit is a collaboration between Catherine Designs and Bisontine.

I know that we scrappers are used to fighting the urge to hug the delivery person when they FINALLY show up with the latest new product release! I’ve seen gals consider staying home from work just to be there when the package gets there! Well, now you can stay on top of your package’s location no matter where you are!

Check out the new Twitter application ”Track This“!

My family was in the “In-Crowd” this past Friday on opening day of High School Musical III. We contributed just under $20 to Disney’s $42 million in gross box office revenue for the weekend. My daughter Danielle was all smiles and her first question when we got out of the theater was ”when can we go see High School Musical IV?”

When the kids went to bed that night my husband was browsing the Internet and asked me if I knew about Scrapblog. Well, of course. I’ve known about Scrapblog since they first launched. After playing around with them I decided to go with Tabblo because I thought Scrapblog’s graphics were too cheesy and because you could not print Scrapblog pages into a book. When I was working in Strategy at a Telecom company I kept tabs on companies like these because they consume a lot of bandwidth. Well, Scrapblog has been busy the last year!

They have interfaces for photo download with just about everyone…Flikr, Photobucket, Facebook, etc. They have recently announced printing. They do not have 12 x 12 books, but their books are stitched and glued. Nice.

There are about 150 designs now, which brings me to the point of my post. Scrapblog’s business development team is doing a stellar job at partnerships! They have three High School Musical III themes to choose from! Each theme has four page designs and every element on the page can be re-sized, deleted or even made semi-transparent!

I’m still not sure that I would print books with them because I’m very picky about my graphics. But, I’m not ruling them out because you can actually start with a blank page and use their graphic elements. They have over 900 background images, 6,000 stickers, shapes, frames and the ability to incorporate video. Halloween graphics are front and center right now, and they are actually pretty darn cute!

As far as I can tell you cannot import your own graphics. But I can’t imagine the licensing logistics if it were that open of a platform. Anyway, kudos go out to Scrapblog for having High School Musical III templates, and by opening night of the movie to boot!

Next time I want to make a Tabblo I might actually give Scrapblog a try! Both companies offer a great way to share your photos online with friends and family in a “layout” style. Scrapblog jazzes things up with graphics and the option of video. Tabblo has plenty of layout styles and infinite color choices. A little more subdued for the photographers that actually want the photo to take center stage.

One thing I can say about the scrapbook industry, you will probably get great goodies if you pay to take a class from a manufacturer! They know how to do it up right!

Here is a picture of my goody bag!

At least 6 of the 8 goodies were ones that I did not already have! I have to say I just LOVED both the wide marker and the Spica glitter pen! I already called my sister Lisa and talked to her about ordering them next. I’m telling you, you will NOT be disappointed with the Spica glitter pens! They are way better than the glittery gel pens I’ve seen. The glitter is achieved with micro glass flakes which are apparently more reflective than the glass beads used by other brands.

I’m hoping to create a short video to show you why I love the wide marker on Sunday. We’ll see if I can capture the excitement on video. I don’t think though that a camera will come close to doing the glitter pen justice!

It can moo like a cow, how about you can you say mooooo?

Ok, sorry, I just had that Dr. Seuss book in my head and couldn’t resist. Can you tell I have small children?

But seriously, I learned soooo much at the Copic Certification class today. It was so worth the four hour drive. I just wish I’d had time to visit with more people in the class and do some of the make and takes next door! But, my kids were waiting at the Great Wolf lodge, and the water slides were calling my daughter’s name. I have an amazing husband who let me go to a coloring class while he was at the water-park with both girls.

So, just a FEW things I learned that a Copic marker can do:

1. Color fabrics. Now you want the “perfect” color of ribbon? Just keep white ribbon on hand and color it any of Copic’s 322 colors. If you heat the fabric the alcohol will evaporate more quickly so it will not bleed as much. The red inks will run, but the rest of them will stay put on fabric! This will not work with the airbrush though because with the airbrush the ink is dry on impact. You have to saturate the fabric with a marker to die the fabric. In the below photo Marianne is proving to us that the ribbon will not bleed when dropped in a glass of water.
2. You can buy an empty set of markers, fill it with food coloring and colorless vanilla, and use the airbrush to decorate cakes!
3. You can mimic “water-coloring” with the markers. Use a plastic palette and pool the color(s). Then fill a water brush with Copic’s colorless blender solution. I only played with it for a few minutes, but it definitely felt like water-coloring. I think this is one instance though where you want to use watercolor paper because otherwise it seems to bleed outside of your lines too easily.
4. You can do all kinds of cool effects with the colorless blender. For example, I brought a bear stamp and we used an old rag with the solution on it to get great “fur” texture. I’d seen Marianne talk about this on her blog, but for me it was a see it to appreciate it moment.
5. You can color surfaces like acrylic and even make custom colored brads!

I will share a few more things from class, probably Sunday because tomorrow night we will be driving back home. And of course I hope to demonstrate more of the techniques as I master them. Some of them are going to require quite a bit of practice!

I stopped by my sister’s house today to pick up some of my goodies that have been arriving from our CHA shopping trip. I wanted to get the adorable Prima animal stamps so I could use them in my Copic class tomorrow.

Two of the Basic Grey papers had also come in and I noticed something I wanted to share. Lisa ordered some of their new 6? pads of paper that were made especially for card makers. I thought it would be handy to have some for when you want to use a paper but don’t want to ruin a whole sheet of 12 x 12 paper that you might want for a scrapbook page.

When I got home I pulled it out to admire the butterfly paper again and I was surprised to realize that the pattern on the 6? paper was actually smaller in scale! How cool is that?

Lisa has not added it to her inventory yet, but I’m sure she will have by the time I get back from Kansas City. I’m just itching to take some fall pics of the girls so that I can use this fabulous “Ambrosia” paper pack!