Coffee Break - Freezelight

Hello coffee breakers!  Today I have something very fun to share with you.  This coffee break is all about freezelight!  Freezelight is a form of photography that uses different colored lights to create a picture.  It is so cool!

 

{Freezelight.RU}

{Freezelight.RU}

{Stanislov V. Mikov}

{artyomlsaenkov}

{epine}

If you are interested in seeing more beautiful freezelight pictures, I recommend visiting Freezelight.RU's Flickr page.  There are so many amazing pictures there.

I couldn't write a post about freezelight without sharing a freezelight stop motion!  Look at this awesome video (also from Freezelight.RU).


Freezelight Magic Forest

Freezelight Magic Forest from FREEZELIGHT.RU on Vimeo.

Thanks for stopping by for your coffee break!

Have a lovely day!

Geek Inspired Giveaway

Hello all!  Just wanted to stop by and tell you that you should head over to my awesome friend Velma's blog, Geek Inspired.  She's having her very first giveaway to celebrate 100 blog posts.  Congratulations, Velma!  :-)

What could you win?

This super cute crochet pumpkin

These awsome arm warmers (I want these!)

Mario Star coffee cozy (LOVE!)

Don't you want to win?  Me too!  So, head over to her blog and enter.  She makes really cute stuff!

 

I Heart Stop Motion - Breathe Me

Hello all!  It's going to be another crazy week!  I have a babysitting job on Wednesday night so I'm losing a night of crafty time.  I'm so behind on my projects!  I have something to finish today or tomorrow and a couple of things I plan to work on this weekend.  So, hopefully I'll have some pretties to share with you this weekend and next week.  I have a couple of things to share with you in the meantime. 

Today, I'm going to share a stop motion video with you.  It happens  to be a music video so you get a pretty song, too!  ;-)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Breathe Me

Artist: Sia

Sia "Breathe Me" from phil tidy on Vimeo.

This is Sia's video for the song Breathe Me.  I love this song so much.  I hear this song and it sounds like a prayer to me.

Help, I have done it again

I have been here many times before

Hurt myself again today

And, the worst part is there's no-one else to blame

Be my friend

Hold me, wrap me up

Unfold me

I am small

I'm needy

Warm me up

And breathe me

Ouch I have lost myself again

Lost myself and I am nowhere to be found,

Yeah I think that I might break

I've lost myself again and I feel unsafe

Be my friend

Hold me, wrap me up

Unfold me

I am small

I'm needy

Warm me up

And breathe me

When I saw that the video for the song was a stop motion video I loved this song even more.  I love it when people take polaroids or printed pictures and make them into stop motion videos.  It's like a double stop motion.  Can you imagine all the work that goes into something like this?  It's very impressive!

As most of you know I have been talking about wanting to make a stop motion video since I started this blog.  Well, I've been setting some goals for myself for the next year and I think this is going on the list.  I don't have any fancy equipment.  Just a little Canon Powershot and my computer.  But, I've done a little research and found that it's workable.  I will have to start small of course, but I'm very excited.  It's still going to be a while before I do this because I have some other things I want to work on first but it's going on the list!  :-)

Any suggestions for stop motion ideas?

Lucky Ladybug

This song was originally recorded by Billie and Lillie in 1959 but when I found this Four Seasons version from 1962 I had to post it instead!  :-)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I made another puffy picture last week.  This one is a ladybug!  I wanted to try a different variation on the turtle puffy picture I made.  This one didn't come out quite as good but I know what I will do differently next time I make it to improve it. 

I am actually pretty happy with how this one came out.  I love anything that I come up with where I can use felt and buttons.  This was a very simple design.  I cut the body and head from black felt and the wings from red.  The ladybug spots are little black buttons. 

I used a blanket stitch to sew everything again.  I love the blanket stitch!  It's cute and functional.  I think I will use red thread to sew the ladybug to the fabric on the next one.  You can see every little imperfection with the black thread.  I still need to get better at my blanket stitch before I start showing it off!  ;-)  I think the stitch needed to be a little wider around the edges, too.  It looks a little too busy when it's that tiny. 

I embroidered the little antenna on myself.  I didn't really think it was necessary to draw them on first.  It was pretty simple.  It was a lot easier than the free hand embroidered mustache I did on Pierre!  That took forever!!!  It was hard to make them look even.


Here is my ladybug!

It has been a crazy week for me so I am way behind on my craft projects.  I'm planning on working on a bunch of projects this weekend so I can have lots to share with you in the next couple of weeks.  They are all experiments.  Just things I made up and wanted to try.  So, I'll either have a bunch of cool projects to show you or I'll have posts about craft projects gone very wrong!  ;-)

Stay tuned!

365 Project - Week Twenty-One

Hello!  It's time for week twenty-one of my 365 project!  I can't believe I'm saying this, but I am so sick of the rain!  I usually love it, but it's really a pain when I only have a limited amount of time during the day to take a picture and I have to take one no matter what.  It always seemed to wait to rain until I got off work, too.  Oh well.  I think I still got a couple of good pictures this week so I'm still happy.  :-)

Here is week twenty-one!


Day 141

I went to lunch and a movie with my mom on Saturday.  Before we went home she needed to go to Lowe's to get something.  I took this picture there.  I love the color of these flowers. 

Day 142

I saw these little mushrooms in my neighbors front yard this morning before I left for church so I snuck over and took a couple of pictures.  :-) 

Day 143

It was raining a LOT when I got off work on Monday.  I took this picture of my front porch while standing in my car port.  It was raining so hard that I still got drenched under the cover of the car port!

Day 144

I had about two minutes to run home and change clothes on Tuesday before I had to pick up my friend and go to Girlie Night in Austin.  Luckily it had stopped raining for that two minutes.  I saw this butterfly and took a quick picture. 

Day 145

It was raining again on Wednesday!  I took some pictures of the clouds but saw this cool tree covered in rain drops when I stopped to pick up dinner on my way to church so I snapped a quick picture.  I thought it looked really cool! 

Day 146

I live by the railroad tracks in Buda.  Today I decided to go take a picture of them.  I thought it would look really cool to stand in the middle of the tracks and take a picture.  It looks like they go on and on forever!

Day 147

This little creek is down the street from my house.  Today my mom and I walked over to the bridge above the creek so I could take a few pictures.  We thought it would be more full since it's been raining so much.  Oh well.  it still looks nice.  :-)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I have been so busy this week that I didn't have time to work on any crafties!  I'm starting to have withdrawals!!!  Not to worry.  I have my whole Saturday set aside for a craft marathon day!  :-)  I have another project that I finished last weekend and haven't had time to take pictures of, too.  Check back tomorrow and see what I made.

Happy weekend!

Coffee Break - Rain

Hello!  It's coffee break time!  :-) 

It has been raining a lot here recently.  A lot!  I have been trying to find new ways to photograph the rain for my 365 Project since that seems to be my only option these days (and I really like to do it).  So, today I thought it would be fun to do a little research and look at some pretty pictures other photographers have taken of the rain.

Rain Drop

{Mrs. Magic}

Lightning

{Brujo+}

Umbrella

{MarcelGermain}



Puddle

{txhippichic}

Rainbow

{Outrageous Images}

These people took amazing pictures!  I hope that some of my rain pictures come out this good.  It's very challenging because you have to have just the right timing.  It was really fun looking through pictures on Flickr to find these.  I hope you like them, too.

What's your favorite thing about the rain?

Happy Glee Day

Today is the season premiere of Glee!  I'm so excited! 

Last time I wrote about Glee I talked about some of the many things I loved about Glee.  Today, in honor of the premiere of season two I thought it would be fun to talk about some of my favorite musical guest stars from season one.  Season one was a musical theater nerd's dream come true.  Some of my favorite people were on the show.

Kristin Chenoweth

I first learned about Kristin when she was in the revival of You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown.  She played Sally Brown and she was magnificent!  Some of her other more famous roles have been Glinda in Wicked and most recently Promises, Promises.

Idina Menzel

I have been a fan of Idina Menzel since her Rent days.  Her voice in Wicked gives me chills.  I don't even have words to describe her talent.  She is amazing!

Neil Patrick Harris

Oh, Neil.  What do I say about Neil?  He can do no wrong.  We have all known him for years.  He has worked in musical theater on broadway, but one of my favorite Neil projects is (of course) Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog!  Did you know that he directed Rent recently, too?  Makes me love him even more!

Jonathan Groff

I know Jonathan Groff from Spring Awakening.  I love that show!  It was so original and the original cast was such a talented group!  He worked with Lea Michele in that show.  He also worked with one of my favorites, John Gallagher, Jr.!

 

Mike O'Malley

Okay, I know he's not a musical theater guy and he's not technically a guest star.  He's more like a regular cast member.  But Mike O'Malley deserves a moment for being so great on this show.  His scenes with Kurt are some of the best parts of the series. 

I think I'm ready for the show now!  :-)

Have a very happy Glee Day!!!

Chibi

Not long after I made Seymour (my very first monster), my friend asked if I could try to make plushies of the characters from the animated movie My Neighbor, Totoro.  I have to admit I was a little bit nervous.  I have only made plushies that were created in my head so it didn't really matter how they came out.  With the Totoro characters I would have to actually try to make them look like something specific. 

I decided to start with Chibi (the little white one) because he was the simplest of the characters.  At first I tried to make him really small but it just wasn't working.  I had to draw him a few times before I got something that I thought would pass for Chibi.  I am terrible at drawing!  Even though this was a very simple shape, it took me forever to get it right...well, right enough!

It's so funny to me how different he was than the picture I drew when he was all finished.  Luckily he still looks a little like Chibi.  :-)  I guess the shape changed some with the sewing and stuffing.

Chibi has a tail so I had to figure out how to sew a plushie with a tail for this project.  This one came out a little crooked but I'm happy that I know how to do it now.  I'm so excited!  Now I can add something new to my own plushie designs!  I can't wait!

I made him out of white fleece since he's all white with white eyes.  His eyes are made of black and white felt and his feet are made of orange felt.  I had to get some felt in there!!  Afterall, this is a plushie made by me!  ;-)

See??

I'm really happy with the way Chibi came out.  I bought enough material to make more than one doll.  I couldn't resist.  This one will go to Sarah.  I will for sure have to make one for me and then another one later on when I'm brave enough to start selling my crafties.  :-)

I think I'm going to give myself a little break and make a plushie that I design next.  It's going to take me a while to draw the pattern for Chu and Totoro anyway.  I also have to start working on a Gir plushie.  My friend asked me to make some plushies for her sons for Christmas presents.  One will be a Gir and the other will be based on a picture her son drew.  I have no idea how I'm going to make Gir!  I'm a little nervous, but I'm sure I'll figure something out.

That's it!  I'll end this one with a little Chibi animation I found when I was looking for reference pictures.  It's very cute!  Have a great weekend!

365 Project - Week Twenty

Week twenty???  Can you believe it??  Me either!  I got some pictures that I really loved this week.  There were a few that could have been better but I had to zoom so much that the picture came out grainy, but I'm still very happy with this week overall.  Day 135, 136 and 138 are my favorites from this week.  They're some of my favorites from the whole project.  I hope you like them, too.  :-)

Here is week twenty!

Day 134

This lizard was climbing around on my car port on Saturday.  He watched me walk around the car port and then wiggled his way down across the fence to the side of my house, watching me the whole time.  I took a bunch of pictures but then I felt kind of bad because I think he was a little scared.  So I left him alone.  Look at that tail!!  It's crazy!  His eyes are pretty amazing, too! 

Here he is wiggling across the fence.  The picture quality is not good but I just loved it!

Day 135

I went to lunch with my friend and her daughter on Sunday at Madam Mam's in Austin.  It was my first time eating there and I loved it!  The entire ceiling was covered in these colorful umbrellas.  I wish I could have gotten more in the picture.  It was so pretty.  I really like this picture.  I wish I could do something like this in my house.  :-)



Day 136

The sky couldn't decide if it wanted to be gloomy and rainy or sunny and bright.  So, it was a little of both.  It's so pretty!  I stopped at the park in Buda on my way home from work and took this picture before it started raining again.  I love it!  :-)

Day 137

Isn't this a cool gate?  It's between two buildings in downtown Buda.  I see if every day when I drive home from work but today I decided to take a picture.  I like the way it looked open with the brick wall behind it.  It's not a very good picture, but I really like this gate.  It's so unique!

Day 138

I saw this flower a couple of weeks ago when I parked at the library to walk somewhere to get another picture.  I went back on Wednesday to to take a picture because it was so beautiful.  I love these colors!

Here's the full flower.

Day 139

Thursday was a yucky picture day for me.  I had no plans for a picture and just wasn't finding anything I wanted to photograph.  Then I decided I would just drive around for a while to find something but the traffic light at the end of my street wasn't working so people were sitting there forever and I couldn't really go anywhere.  I gave up and walked around at home until this little cutie started flying around in my face.  Seriously!  It was in my face!  I couldn't get a very good picture of it but I was happy to have something.  :-)


Day 140

It started raining...really raining...as soon as I left work today.  It was pouring down a lot by the time I got home.  I was kind of limited on what I could take a picture of because I didn't want to get my camera too wet.  This is what I got.  I think it's okay.  :-)

Happiness is...Acting Like a Child

As an adult when someone tells us we are acting like a child they don't mean it in a very good way.  Well, I think we need to turn it around and see it in a whole new way.  We can learn a lot from kids.  I think we should try acting like them more often! 

Think about it.  Kids are so free.  If they want to sing really loud in the middle of a store they do.  If they want to twirl around in circles for no reason they can.  They can wear the craziest outfit and no one thinks they're crazy.  They live with no regrets.

{weheartit}

Kids don't have a lifetime of people putting them down or telling them what they shouldn't be.  They don't have the self-consciousness that we develop as grown ups.  Everything is still new and magical to them.  As adults we just get through the day sometimes.  We lose sight of all the magic around us.

I saw this video for the first time yesterday and fell in love.  You may have already seen it.  I'm not sure how long it has been around.  Yes, it is a cell phone commercial.  Just ignore that part and enjoy the fun of it and what it's saying.  It made me think about how much more fun it is to act like a child.  So, Why not be like that more often?  :-) 

I hope you have a wonderful day!  My goal for today is to enjoy myself and act like a child as much as possible.  :-)

Coffee Break - Nonesuch Garden

Hello!  Welcome to this week's coffee break.  Do you have your coffee ready?  I have something very special to share with you today! 

I have been on the hunt for new techniques I can learn for my plushie designs for the past few weeks.  I came across the flickr page for Nonesuch Garden and fell in love.  Seriously...this person is my plushie hero.  I want to learn to make felt plushies like this.  I would settle for half as good.  These are amazing!  They are more than just felt plushies.  They are works of art!

Nonesuch Garden is the creation of cartoonist and artist Megan Baehr.  She created Nonesuch Garden as a way to support herself with her art.  If I could afford to, I would buy each and every one of these plushies.  :-) 

I thought I would share a few of the pretty felt plushies with you today.  They are all so wonderful so if you are interested in seeing the rest you can visit Nonesuch Gardens on flickr.  You can also purchase some of them on Etsy. 

Meili the Panda

Cocoa the Puppy

Sullivan the Turtle

Grace the Doe

Jenski the Stegosaurus

I'll leave you with those for now.  It is just a coffee break after all. ;-)

I'm a little behind on my personal crafties because I wasn't feeling too great last week and I have been working on three projects at once.  I plan to have lots of goodies to share with you this weekend and next week.  So, stay tuned!

That's it for this coffee break! 

Have a wonderful day!!

I Heart Stop Motion - T-Shirt Wars

Well, I planned to show you the plushie I made this weekend but I haven't been able to take pictures of it yet.  It was so gloomy when I got home from work yesterday so it was too dark to get a decent picture.  I'll probably post it on Saturday.  That's such a long time!  I can't wait to show you!  :-)

I still wanted to share something fun with you today, so I decided this would be the perfect time for another installment of I Heart Stop Motion!  I'm very excited about this one...

It's a double feature!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

T-Shirt War

by Rhett & Link

This video is so cool!!!  I can't figure out how they did it!  I want to know how they showed the shirts changing when they just pulled them off.  So weird!  My favorite parts were the green shirts with the balloon and the black shirts with the switches.  I love the music and sound effects, too.  This is so creative!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

T-Shirt War 2

by Rhett & Link

Since I promised you a double feature today, here is the commercial they made for McDonald's based on the original T-Shirt War video.  I love how they take the picture off the shirt and it becomes something real in both videos.  If I had a french fry t-shirt I would definitely want it to do that! 

I really want to learn to do something like this.  It's like a magic trick.  These guys are very talented!  They're pretty funny, too!

Here are some behind the scenes videos they made for both stop motions...in case you're a big nerd like me and like to watch that kind of stuff.  ;-) 

I hope you weren't too bored with my geeky obsession.  I just find this so fascinating.  I watched these videos so many times when I found them yesterday trying to figure out each little bit.  I still can't figure out most of it...even with the behind the scenes videos!

Have a great day!  :-)

Beauty from Pain

I was watching NBC Nightly News the other night and they had a piece called Making a Difference that I found so inspiring I wanted to share it. 

Some of the photographers who photographed pictures from the aftermath of the Katrina hurricane had their work on display recently in New Orleans.  Instead of just looking at pictures of the tragedy they decided to find hope in their community in a very unique way.  These photographers held a workshop for students to help them photograph the city how it is today and show how much the community has come together and kept their culture and city alive in the last five years.

I love this idea!  Instead of only focusing on all the negativity and sadness that this community is completely justified in feeling, they chose to focus on all the wonderful things in New Orleans.  One of the girls in the video said it so perfectly.

"It's about the people and the culture and not about the physical."

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

This story brought to mind a song called Beauty from Pain. It's about how we go through rough times but in the end we come out on the other side of it more beautiful because we've learned something about ourselves and found that we are strong.  We just have to look for the beauty in our pain.  It's there.  It's just hard to see when you are in the middle of it.



The chorus says:

After all this has passed, I still will remain
After I've cried my last, there'll be beauty from pain
Though it won't be today,
Someday I'll hope again
And there'll be beauty from pain
You will bring beauty from my pain

I feel like this is the exact reason behind this workshop.  They made it through their painful times and are now able to find beauty from it.  :-)

Here are a couple of my favorite pictures from the students.  I encourage you to visit the website and see the rest for yourself.  They are very impressive!

I'm going to spend my day looking for the beauty in every situation.

  Have you been inspired by anything recently?  I'd love to hear about it.  :-)