Cathy Zielske's Blog

Project Life, Week Twenty-One

OBSERVATIONS: Another week of Project Life mirrors another week of real life. Ahhh. Love how it works out like that. This week includes a majority of photos from our weekend up at the family cabin. We stayed through Sunday but those pictures will have to be part of next week's Project Life. If I'm following PL Protocol, I document Sunday through Saturday in each spread and not an extra day on either side. If I end up splitting a trip, so be it. Call me a crazy PL Rebel… or don't.

This week also included some shots with my new lenses. I definitely need to get out and practice with them both and work on that steady hand for the crispy shots I so love.

Here are the pages:

One thing that was intersting about the cabin this time out? My brother in law, Steve, has his iPhone set up as a wireless hot spot, so we could get online inside the house. Usually, we go next door and steal Dan's Aunt and Uncle's wireless signal (they live there much of the year). So it felt a little indulgent to be inside and online. We were debating whether it was a good thing or a bad thing. But we all agreed it never got old to point out that Steve was a hot spot.

I also love this not so great shot of breakfast. We always crowd in around the table for meals and it's so quintessentially the cabin.

Here's the weekly recap card:

And that wraps up Week Twenty-One.

SUPPLIES:

InLinkz.com

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Project Life, created by Becky Higgins, is a flexible, easy-to-use, highly customizable way to save your memories in a fun, stress-free way. Learn more about getting started with Project Life by clicking here.

The Scrapbooker's New Toys

Photo taken with my new Canon 50mm Compact Macro lens.

You know how every now and then photo-lovin' women get the itch for something new?

Or maybe how it happens more often than every now and then?

When I was in Seattle last week, I got to spend some time with the beautiful and talented Tracey Clark who introduced me to two cool lenses that I decided on the spot I really needed to have. Needs? Wants? What the hell! Mama likes them write offs!

I bought one of these:

I took it up north over Memorial Day weekend and started to get to know it. I've never had any macro capabilities, and am really looking forward to exploring what it can do. Here are a few images I shot with it.

I call this one Extreme Bark.

And this one? Extreme moss.

This one is of a clematis in my back yard.

The second toy lens Tracey showed me was the Olloclip.

This nifty little guy goes right over your iPhone 4 or 4s camera. Like this:

The previous two Olloclip photos were taken with my new 50mm Compact Macro. I call that Blog Post Lensception.

It offers you three options: wide angle, fish eye and macro (and let me tell you, it is an extreme macro.)

Macro example:

YIKES! What IS that? (The same clematis blossom as seen above.)

And that? My patio table.

I realize that this extreme need for close up might be overkill, but here's a nice image from my weekend up North using the Wide Angle lens. I call it: Cabin Juice.

What's so fun about the Olloclip is that you can use it with your favorite iPhone photo applications. For me, that means mostly Instagram.

I'm guessing I'll get a lot more use out of the 50mm lens than the Olloclip, but hey, sometimes you just have to jump in with both feet.

And by all means, save your receipts for the tax man.

 

 

Honoring those who serve and have served

Wishing everyone a safe and peaceful Memorial Day.

The winners of the Freckled Fawn gift cards are…

The two blog readers who will each receive a $15 gift card from Freckled Fawn to spend as they please are:

Ladies, contact me at czdesign@comcast.net and I'll get you hooked up. 

Sponsor Giveaway: Freckled Fawn

Two blog readers will each receive a $15 gift card from Freckled Fawn to spend as they please.

ABOUT FRECKLED FAWN: Freckled Fawn is an online shop run by Doe and Deer. The shelves are packed with washi tape, fabric tape, labels, tags, doilies, and more. Go ahead, have a little shopping spree, and freckle your creativity with loveliness.

TO ENTER THIS GIVEAWAY: Leave me a comment today and tell me the last scrapbook item you purchased. I'll choose the winners on Sunday night.

This post is now closed. Check back later to see if you're a winner.

Project Life, Week Twenty

OBSERVATIONS: Well I guess the card says it all: what a fun week! Kicking off with Mother's Day and ending with dinner at the Space Needle in Seattle, last week was fairly atypical for this homebody. Up until last week, I hadn't flown since Simple Scrapbooks folded. I used to fly a lot. Now, not so much. It was a real treat to fly out to my home state, and that dominates the week's images.

Side note: I don't love flying. I think the older I get, the weirder it seems to me to be hurling through the atmostphere at ridiculous speeds. And honestly, how do those planes stay in the air? I mean, really? At one point, on the way home, we were heading into Minneapolis storms, so they were going to divert us to Fargo. The turbulence wasn't crazy, but it made my stomach drop a few times and in order to keep my cool, I had to picture that scene in Bridesmaids when the woman turns to Kristen Wiig and says, "I had a dream last night. That we went down... You were in it." Always makes me smile.

Second side note: Yes! I used washi tape this week for the first time ever. Who says an old dog can't learn new tricks?

Onto the week's pages!

Who doesn't love cute little blond girls? P.S. Molly, why didn't you make them my God children again?

This week I dropped a couple of type treatments onto a few of the Seattle photos. I like the way that looks. Simple and not in any distracting area of the photo.

More journaling about Seattle.

And the recap card.

And that's all she wrote for Week Twenty.

SUPPLIES:

InLinkz.com

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Project Life, created by Becky Higgins, is a flexible, easy-to-use, highly customizable way to save your memories in a fun, stress-free way. Learn more about getting started with Project Life by clicking here.

The winner of the spot in simplify 101's Organize Your Creative Space is…

The winner of the seat in the new workshop Organize Your Creative Space is:

Trisha, email me at czdesign at comcast dot net to claim your seat! Happy organizing!

My Hometown

Last week a business meeting took me all the way to Seattle, the city that I love and the city in which I was born. It's been over three years since I was last in Washington, so I tacked on a few days in order to spend it in my true hometown, Everett. My best friend, Molly, still lives there where she's married and raising her two adorable and precocious daughters, Anne and Aida.

There is something about the air there. It smells different. Maybe it's because you can get close to the water and smell the salt in the air. Or maybe it's all those pine trees and all that moss and all that rain. It's a verdant land, that Pacific Northwest.

After my visit with Molly, I headed to Seattle for a meeting with the folks from Big Picture Classes.

Lucky for me, that meant getting to hang out with Ali and Stacy and my new friend, Tracey.

We stopped at Ivar's on the Pier for a fish and chips snack.

We headed off to the Space Needle for a tasty dinner with a 360-degree very slowly rotating view.

We left Seattle to head over to Carnation where Stacy's parents live and held our meeting on Saturday morning before all boarding planes to our respective homes.

I always get a bit nostalgic when I'm home for any length of time. Though I wouldn't trade the path of my life for anything, I still wonder what it would be like to live in the town I'm from.

This is a picture of Silver Lake. I spent every summer there, trying in vain for that Washington tan, swimming in the lake, and probably doing a few things I ought to not have been doing. So many memories wash over me just looking at this Instagram shot.

A song came to mind, a song called "Hometown" by the insanely underrated Joe Jackson. If you're a fan, you'll know it. If not, here's a little taste of the lyric:

Hometown by Joe Jackson

Of all the stupid things I could have thought
This was the worst
I started to believe
That I was born at seventeen
And all the stupid things
The letters and the broken verse
Stayed hidden at the bottom of the drawer
They'd always been
And now I plough through piles
Of bills, receipts and credit cards
And tickets and the Daily News
And sometimes I just . . .

Wanna go back to my home town
Though I know it'll never be the same
Back to my home town
'Cause it's been so long
And I'm wondering if it's still there...

For anyone who somehow became separated from the place in which you grew up, it might resonate with you. In fact, sometimes this song breaks my heart in the best of ways.

 

Here's to where you're from.

Monday Giveaway from simplify 101

• Do you feel like you spend all of your creative time sifting through creative clutter?

• Does it feel like as soon as you haul out your supplies, it’s time to put them away again?

• Are you regularly surprised to find supplies or tools you forgot you had? Or worse, are you regularly frustrated when you can’t put your hands on the things you are sure you have?

• Do you feel like your creative space (or the lack of it) zaps your creativity?

If you answered “yes” to any of these, there is a better way. Aby Garvey at simplify 101 has created a brand new workshop—Organize Your Creative Space—to help you find the perfect balance between creativity and organization. In this workshop, you’ll find out how to pull together a space that looks like you, thinks like you and allows you to enjoy your creative work even more. Best of all, you’ll learn how to create an organized space that inspires you and fuels your creativity.

Organizing and creativity go hand-in-hand, so I’m really excited about this new workshop! As with all their online workshops, it’s designed to let you tackle your organizing projects on your time schedule, with the support of a creative organizing expert and a friendly online community. Best yet, with their generous refund policy, you can try this workshop for one week completely risk-free.

 TODAY'S GIVEAWAY: One lucky reader will win a seat in this class. Here are the ways to enter this giveaway (up to four chances to win!):

1. Leave a comment on this post telling me where you do your creative work. (And if you care to elaborate, how’s that working out for you?)
2. Subscribe to simplify 101’s blog. Come back and leave a comment letting me know you did.
3. Sign up to receive simplify 101’s weekly quick tip, then leave a comment letting me know you did.
4. Pin the Organize Your Kitchen graphic on Pinterest, then come back and let me know you did.

I'll randomly select a winner on Tuesday night by 9 p.m. CST. Good luck!

Bonus: Though only one of you will win a free spot, all my readers get a 15% discount from simplify 101. To take advantage of this offer, CZ15MAY during checkout. This coupon may be applied to any of simplify 101’s current online workshop (instant downloads are excluded) through May 28, 2012 and may not be combined with any other offers. 

Comments are now closed. Check back to see if you're a winner.

The winner of a seat in iScrapit is…

The winner of a seat in this new workshop with Renee Pearson, iScrapit, is:

Michelle, contact me at czdesign@comcast.net and I'll get you set up! : )