Two

You know that completely baffling and confusing moment when you realise you've forgotton your own birthday?
No?
Just me then.

I actually didn't forget my real life birthday. I well and truly enjoyed that with a glass or two of Pimms with some wonderfully generous and gorgeous friends.

How many chins? Birthday silliness.

It was on Sunday. I wasn't two.



BUT MY BLOG WAS!

I missed my bloggerversary.

How could I?

Happy Second birthday, Five Go Blogging!

The Big One, when he was a wee one.

This revelation has made me realise that I have been neglecting my blog. I've been taking it for granted, cruising through the week with an review here and a couple of my favourite weekly linkies there but I haven't been in love with it like I used to. I could blame that floosy Instagram but in all honesty I've just been lazy.

So my dear blog, my birthday present to you is a makeover. New header, new buttons, and some new fresh content. Watch this space!


Joining in with Sticky Fingers and the theme of Two for The Gallery.

Inch by inch

I normally crush and squeeze and tease my daily photos into some kind of theme at the end of the week.

But instead I am going to use this weeks photos as prompts for a little dedication to my wonderful, generous and loving Mr.

Inch by inch,

drop by drop,

step by step,

tile by tile,

crumb after crumb,

hand over hand upward,

till i get to where I need to be.

With you.

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Twenty Five Years

Twenty five years.
Twenty. Five. Years.

Whichever way I write it, it is a quarter of a century.
That is how long it has been since my husband swept me off my feet at a party (back when they were called discos). Seems like yesterday.

So the theme for this week is time.

Me-time crafting turned into puppet making.
We don't look a day older (you'll have to trust me on that).
My Princess is growing up too quickly.
Telling the time with a dandelion clock. It was 15 o'clock by the way.
We collected leaves on our walk to pass the time. (Someone was bored)
Garden party cake making to raise money for MNDa, in honour of Ned, 9 years living with the disease and still fighting.
The quickest monster making ever thanks to Parragon Books.


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Pixum Photobook - Review

I think you probably know that I like taking pictures right?
So what do you think I said to Pixum when they asked if I would like to create a photo book and then review it?
Youbetcha!

I am notoriously useless when it comes to doing anything with the photos I have taken. I have folders overflowing with GB's of photos on the desktop, even more on the laptop (which maybe why there is so little memeory left) and then just a few more on the backup disc drive. There may also be a suitcase full in the loft. Actually I know this to be a fact because I was up there blowing the dust of it to find some older pictures to put into my album.

It was our 10th wedding anniversary this year, and in lieu of a diamond I thought we could make a photo album of our 10 years together. And when I say 'we' I obviously mean me ;-)

I was offered this review back in February, with then 3 months notice before our wedding anniversary. Loads of time! NOT! It has taken 3 months to go through all the thousands of photos I have to find the 'right' ones. I didn't want to overfill the album, and I wanted to pick as many of us together as possible to show how we have grown old together. I cannot emphasise enough, how long this is likely to take anyone contemplating this sort of exercise.

I also had to do it in secret because I wanted it to be a surprise. So 3 months wasn't quite enough and here I am 4 months later with a photo book.

You have to download the Pixum software onto your computer which is very simple and takes no effort. You then select the product that you want. There are a vast number of combinations to choose from like Large square, landscsape or portrait formats, hardcover or soft cover, paper type, and you can even use one of their themed designs for Christmas for example. Most formats start with 26 pages but you can add additional pages if you are struggling to whittle the photos down.

You then simply upload the images you want to use and drag and drop them into the album.

My TOP tip is to go through all your scattered images first and get them organised into one folder so you aren't having to skip about all over your folders to locate the right image. I also pre edited my pictures so that I knew I had already cropped or added a filter as I wanted.

By selecting the photo book format the blank pages are all laid out along the bottom of the screen. You can then choose the layout you would like for each page. So you may want 1, 2, 3 or more pictures on a page and you may want them all lined up straight or slightly tilted or overlapping. You can do all of these things to get the perfect look for your album. You can also select a background colour or effect for each page or even a background image on which your photos will be positioned.

You can start using the Pixum wizard to lead you through each step or just dive straight in which I did. To be honest I felt more in control going straight to the editor than using the wizard because the wizard felt like I was going to have to use a pre-set design which I didn't want to do.

I found it very easy to drag and drop my photos into the book and then adjust the size or position if I needed to. Like windows you drag the corners to size or the edges to move the image. Along the top of the screen is a toolbar which has many added gizmos to improve, design and edit your book further but one to take note of is on the photos toolbar. There is a face icon which changes from red to amber to green to indicate the quality of the image that will be printed. Your call but I adjusted the size of all of mine to get a green face. This ensured that they weren't pixelated at all and the best quality they could be.

There is also an auto-image correction button which means that the image is improved if necessary in production. This could be very handy!

With a little bit of playing I discovered that you can add text boxes. Small enough for a little label or big enough to write a paragraph. The font options are quite extensive too so you can achieve the look you are aiming for.

Getting the album to be as good as I felt I could get it did take time. No getting away from the fact that if you want a quality product you need to give it plenty of time to produce it. After the months of photo gathering, I then spent several hours editing the book. Exhausting work!

I must have proof checked it a dozen times. Spelling, the right order, the right photo! But the finished product arrived quickly and looks amazing. A real book!


Disclosure: Thank you Pixum for offering this picture book for free.

Pixum is the leading, independent and multiple award-winning online photo service in Europe. Next to the free use of online albums and photo-sharing, Pixum offers inexpensive and professional lighting of digital photos on real photo paper and fun-products (e.g. mugs, puzzles, t-shirts, cards, calendars, frames and much more). Pixum produces 90% of the UK orders in the UK. 

My Bloggerversary

30th May 2011.

One year ago today I posted my first blogpost about my to-do lists. The first list was all about housework which still remains, a whole year later, on the to-do list. The second list was all the things I wanted to achieve. It was a short list but with some significant milestones.

1. Top of the list was Make Things. Still on the list but only because as soon as I've made something there is something else to make. And add to that the #pinaddicts meme and I have to make at least one thing every month.
2. Then there was Write Things. Still on the list (spotting the trend here?) only because this blogging lark is totally addictive and I love it so much. Why would I stop? The novel is still in draft form (in my head).
3. Sleep more. Hmm, what I failed to realise was that blogging eats into your time and I think I actually sleep less. Oh well.
4. The retreat? Zero progress on that one although I have a plan involving a shed and a tin of paint. Thing is, the Mr wants it for his den too. We may have to have his and hers!
5. Be a retail consultant. Well I may not be a retail consultant (yet) but there are plans afoot to be a consultant of sorts, so maybe by my next bloggerverary...
6. A Social Media Consultant will definitely have to wait. Actually it has completely lost its appeal. Having said that I love all things social media if I could only keep up with it all. Perhaps I just need considerably more practice ;-)

As nice as it is to look back at my year of blogging and laugh at my first blog post (and my first comments x) the real reason for this post is to thank anyone who has ever looked at my blog or even read some of it and taken the time to write a comment.

Lots of blogging love to my lovely regular followers. I love you all, especially YOU. x