Sara

Earrings, A Cat Banner, & Lights Bokeh Lights

There’s only two more digests after this, and I’m eager to wrap it up because it means I can start a new project. (I think five months off is enough recovery time, don’t you?) I’ve also been making minor adjustments (and will continue to do so) over the next few days (more like weeks if my track record proves anything) to the site design. They are changes I meant to do when this design was new, but was too busy doing client work that I just didn’t get around to it. Now I’m making time!

FAVORITE Even though it didn’t stitch properly, I love the “Habits” photo because of the crazy light bokeh from the tree and then again in the reflections.

NOT SO MUCH The very first photo for the prompt “Street”. I had so many good ideas but I just didn’t get a chance to go out on the street like I wanted to. One of the downfalls of having a good word on a busy day, I guess.

BEHIND THE SCENES The book featured in “Historic” is one I picked up at a second hand shop in Rochester, New York. I love it so much it sits on my desk now.

“Street” Dec 5th (Day 339)

No snow…

“Ice” Dec 6th (Day 340)

Here’s the video.

“Habits are cobwebs at first, cables at last.” Dec 7th (Day 341)

The photo stitch on this didn’t really turn out very well, so it makes the living room look tiny, but I like the rest of it too much to care!

I’ve always wanted to feel okay (and not panicked) if someone decided to randomly stop by the apartment, whether to drop something off or to come in for a cup of tea. However, that’s kind of hard sometimes when you live with lots of people. Even if you break up the chores, sometimes they don’t get done, etc, so when Tom and I moved into this apartment together I was excited that my (sometimes overboard) cleaning desires could be put to good use. It’s habit for me to clean up the dinner dishes while I’m waiting for the meal to cook, and Mondays I wake up by mindlessly vacuuming. These are just parts of my routine. Just a few days ago our super asked us if he could show our apartment to his bosses, and I didn’t have to do anything except open the door. Fifteen minutes a day insures the apartment is spotless all the time. Ah, cables at last indeed.

“Rainbow” Dec 8th (Day 342)

A beautiful cat banner (and holiday card) arrived in the mail from Peregrine.

“Bird” Dec 9th (Day 343)

Cover of my 2012 planner!

“Historic” Dec 10th (Day 345)

This Singing World
An Anthology of Modern Poetry for Young Children
Printed December, 1928

“Button” Dec 11th (Day 346) & “Crunchy” Dec 12th (Day 347)

“Silver” Dec 12th (Day 348)

I don’t wear earrings because when I do unfortunately they must be sterling silver or 14k gold otherwise my ears become very sensitive and itchy. Mega bummer.

Christmas Decorations, A New Tree, & Rochester In The Morning

It’s kind of weird seeing the Christmasy photos popping up in my digest of the Spurred project, as winter is the last thing on my mind right now. No ma’am, I’m ready for the warm weather that the weatherman has promised! Last night we had a thunderstorm (I believe it was actually Atlas’s first)- and instead of hiding like our other cats did during their first, he sat at the window and watched in curiosity. Of course he did.

Favorite My favorite photo of the bunch is “Cool”, because it was a struggle to get that sucker to stitch properly! I’m not that tall so to try and get a stich without changing the angle was a little hard!

Not So Much My least favorite is probably “News”, again because I just didn’t put that much effort into it. It could have been a lot better. I will always give kudos and totally respect those photographers who pump out an amazing work of art every day for an entire year.

Behind The Scenes Our awesome friends in Rochester have a crazy assortment of board games, and this really spurred on our board game obsession during Christmas. The photo for “Natural”, of board game Dead-End-Drive is a game we actually played. I was the cat and the old lady and in the end it was down to Tom and me. (I won.) It was so much fun!

Happy Friday! (Less than 30 days left on the Spurred project digest! What project should I do next?)

“Everyday” Nov 26th (Day 330)

Atlas bathes us every day. I try not to let him bathe me because my hair is longer and I don’t want him to choke. Doesn’t stop him from trying though, the cutie.

“Childhood” Nov 27th (Day 331)

My favorite is “The Snowman”.

“Package Nov 28th (Day 332)

I pulled the Christmas decorations out of the box in which they were packed.
Stitched together from 8 images.

“News” Nov 29th (Day 333)

Tom and I won NaNo!

“Fun” Nov 30th (Day 334)

Someone clearly had fun poking around in the fireplace today.
Oh, Atlas, my little explorer.

“Different” Dec 1st (Day 335)

I put up my old Christmas tree but the lights and a few branches had been damaged in the move across the border so after a few hours tearing my hair out trying to get it to work, we brought home a new one. We like it much better because it has pine cones!

“Cool” Dec 2nd (Day 336)

We brought home a new (artificial) tree this year, but we re-used our older ornaments. I’ve always wanted to have three or four “themes” to rotate in between every year, and this is a very “cool” tree, so we’re thinking next year we’ll do warm tones: perhaps bronzes and reds.

“Natural” Dec 3rd (Day 337)

In early December we went to visit friends we met online and spend the weekend at their apartment. It’s always scary at first, wondering if things will be different when you actually meet in person, but meeting these two was like meeting up with our best friends from junior high. As exciting and as natural as can be.

“Grey” Dec 4th (Day 338)

A grey morning from our weekend in Rochester.

A Lot Of Red In November

If I seem quiet over here it’s because I’ve been working really hard to get this next little batch of actions ready for you photographers before spring really hits and melts right into summer. (And before work starts picking up for me.) Life for me lately has been packed with busy, but filled with good stuff too like tea, yoga, really fast showers, and detoxing from the day with television shows. Tom has also been working on a play, so Saturdays are spent all day at his dad’s doing laundry while they work, bike rides, and now that the weather is nicer: photo walks.

“Sound” Nov 18th (Day 322)

I wish I had more time to play! (I also wish I would finally get around to bringing home a ukulele and viola!) Though I recently just downloaded the Garage Band app and have been in heaven tinkering with making music in my spare time (Ha, what spare time?) – I actually made the looping track used in the video of my latest hair tutorial. Pretty neat, huh?

“Numbers” Nov 19th (Day 323)

Here in Canada there’s pretty much a monopoly on the internet/telephone/cellphone providers. They charge an arm and a leg for service (and charge per bandwidth, which shocked me silly when I first came from the States) and cancellation of your contract early can be up to $400! (Actually a bill passed here a few weeks ago to cap that to $50! Thanks, Ontario!) So back in November we were switching our service over to another company and we had a few days where we were without a phone line because our old company was just that awful.

“Memory” Nov 20th (Day 324)

I find I have fun doing a double exposure of a photo taken one year previous on the same day. I thought for “memory” it was fitting. (Photographers can grab a free double exposure action.)

“Short” Nov 21st (Day 325)

I’m 5’4″, but I still love wearing flats, even though I often feel short.

“Welcome” Nov 22nd (Day 326)

I have a little cupboard with tea and desserts stored just for when we have guests come over. In Ireland Tom’s family greeted you at the door and immediately offered a cup of tea and cookies, no matter how brief your visit. When we came back I realized it was something I wanted to do as well.

“Heat” Nov 23rd (Day 327)

Cozy socks and the baseboard heater.

“Unfamiliar” Nov 24th (Day 328)

For Thanksgiving (we celebrate Canadian & USA) this year I took a risk and cooked something I’d never tried before, crossing my fingers and hoping it turned out all right. It was delicious, and now I’m craving some!

“Grain” Nov 25th (Day 329)

4 Photo Stitch

Only 44 Days Left

On Sunday Atlas turned a year old! We haven’t had him that long of course (we didn’t bring him home until the very end of July) but I still can’t believe he’s been in our lives for almost nine months. And thank you so much for all of your lovely & supportive responses about my hair, I’m really really happy about it, and I’m still working through replying to you all. (And I will!)

“Reflection” Nov 10th (Day 314)

Taken on the Minolta SRT200. I make sure to meter for the scene before the shot, but then I remember my skin is like a lighthouse sometimes and will probably botch it up anyway. (Do you see my reflection in the top left?)

“Inside” Nov 11th (Day 315)

Sometimes my heart is heavy thinking about how the cats will spend their lives “trapped” inside our apartment/house and not have the chance to venture outside, but in a city as busy as this we can’t let them wander out on their own. I take Morn out for walks on occasion since he spent a great deal of his kitten hood outside, but sometimes I wish we had a nice backyard where he could explore without a lead.

“Delicious” Nov 12th (Day 316)

Mmm, tofu scramble.

“Sticky” Nov 13th (Day 317)

Part of going to the theatre for us means preparing our own snacks, but it’s one of the few times where we go all out and make favorites otherwise deemed unhealthy. Here I’m making dough for our own pretzel dogs!

“Man Made” Nov 14th (Day 318)

Who doesn’t love a nice romantic gesture?

“Purple” Nov 15th (Day 319)

A run in my favorite (and new!) tights already. One of the downsides to having cats is that they put holes in almost everything.

“Empty” Nov 16th (Day 320)

That empty spot is where we put our leftovers.

“Irony” Nov 17th (Day 321)

Our internet went down and all my prompts are on my Google Calender. So you get pizza.

My favorite photo from this batch would have to be either “Inside” or “Delicious”. I have such a hard time capturing steam normally and I love how barely there, sort of like an accessory. My least favorite photo is “Empty”, just because of the quality. I can tell I was getting really tired and swamped with this project by this point. I’m having a lot more days where I just gave up and snapped something quickly.

Random Tidbit: Back in October I found a blogger taking on a No Trash Project, and I’ve been meaning to apply a lot of it in our home as well. I’d like to see our fridge filled with jars (as if I need another excuse to collect jars) instead of plastic and zip-lock bags.