Get Crafty

I’ve been doing lots of crafty things lately, so I’m sharing them in a post all by themselves!  Above is one morning before work, I was re-categorizing my stamp organization on my craft desk.

So, remember my DIY Glitter Foam Alphabet post?  I bought this DCWV 6x6 Cork Stack.  I tried using my shaped punches with the adhesive cork sheets and they turned out fantastic!  How cute are these little cork stickers for embellishments?

I ran the cork sheets through my Sizzix Big Shot with the Lawn Fawn Cole’s ABC dies and used them on this Project Life insert.  (Full May PL post coming on Thursday.)

Speaking of Project Life… I am really LOVING my Fiskars Procision paper trimmer.  Even photos cut like butter!  My old Fiskars rotary trimmer couldn’t really handle photo paper well.  I would have to press down really hard and run the blade through the photo paper twice to trim the photos.  This Procision is the best!

I posted this photo on Instagram and the Fiskars social media team found me.  They tweeted my photo!

And before I spent last Sunday doing seven pages for my May Project Life album, I organized my Studio Calico May PL kit Camelot into an IRIS clear divided tray so I could see everything.

Not everything came with the kit, the labels are digital print & cut, the cork shapes I made, and some of the badges are from Kelly Purkey.

And here’s a sneak peek at one of my May pages.

Ali Edwards shared on Instagram how she takes embellishments out of their packaging and staples the  sheet to the backing.  I loved it and wanted to do the same with my enamel dots so they are just ready to use and I don’t have to fiddle with the package.  So I took them all out of the package and stapled the sheets to the backing, then put them all on a ring.  It works great!

And… I created these 4x6 printables in Photoshop, using digital brushes and PS shapes.  I plan to use my 1” and 1.25” circle punches to cut them out and use them on my PL and regular scrapbook pages.  Aren’t they cute? 

Someone on Instagram asked me if I was selling these.  I replied that since I used some personal-use only digital brushes on these, I couldn’t sell them or give them away.  However, many of these are my own designs.  I can replace a few of these circles with my own designs and then I’d be able to give it away as a download here on my blog. You simply print them out on 4x6 matte paper. Anyone interested? 

All of these photos were shared on my Instagram account over the last couple of weeks.  If you want to keep more update with my life and crafty photos, you can follow me on Intagram!  :-)

He Works Hard for the BBQ Sandwich

Todd has been cycling up a storm.  Photo above is last Sunday when he biked along the coast with his friend Steve.  Today he actually rode 60 miles, the longest ride before his Ironman 70.3 race in two weeks.

This one from June 1st, cycling past Moonlight Beach.

On 6/15 he rode past the hills about a mile from our house, where the Bernardo Fire from May charred the entire hillside.  Scary.

Remember my post about how Todd bought 4 pairs of shoes in one week?  These trail runners was one of the pairs.  On his first trail run the shoes got dirty already!

And quite possibly the best photo from recent memory… Todd’s dodgeball team at work.  They did not win the tournament… in fact they lost their first game.  But if looks counted, well, they should have been the dodgeball kings.

So all this exercising makes for a hungry boy!  On Friday 6/20, we headed down to Lemon Grove to try out Coop’s West Texas BBQ.  My friend Mariko and her hubby Ron loves Coop’s BBQ, it’s their favorite BBQ in San Diego.  So we thought it was a moral imperative to try it out.  Plus, we were going to a Poncho Sanchez concert nearby, so it was perfect timing!

Coop’s was not very big and not very assuming.  There were about 8 tables in the restaurant.

For the first time in my life, I had southern sweet tea!  And boy was it sweet!

Todd had the smoked brisket sandwich.  He liked it a lot!

I had the pork spareribs with collard greens and potato salad.  I really liked the smoky flavor of the meat.  There was 5-6 different BBQ sauces on the table and we tried most of them.  My favorite was one that was sweet and spicy.

After dinner, we headed to Jacobs Center to see Poncho Sanchez and his Latin jazz band.  This was actually our second time seeing him.  We saw Poncho Sanchez the first time at Anthology in 2011.  He is a multiple Grammy winner and lifetime Grammy award winner!

The music was great and high-energy.  Lots of people got up to dance on the two dance floors they set up.  We really enjoyed the music and atmosphere. 

You know what other concert we’re going to next weekend?  KISS and Def Leppard!  I can’t wait!

I made this shredded turkey avocado quesadilla at home for lunch last weekend and it was SO delicious!

On Friday night 6/27, AJ & Meera called to invite us last minute to have dinner with them at Rubios.  We love seeing them so of course we said yes!  So thankful for good friends.

Yesterday we had lunch at Karl Strauss.  Todd had just ran 10 miles at the lake in preparation for his upcoming triathlon.  So he was hungry!

We shared a turkey avocado bacon sandwich and a seared ahi salad.

Both were super-delicious!

Some Noodle cuteness.  Lately he’s taken to hanging out on the stairs.

He’s also loving the scratching cardboard box that Todd bought for him.  He’ll scratch it a little and then crawl into it, lol.

Laying on Todd while we watch TV.  Such silliness!

Noodle in a basket.

At the top of the stairs so he can check us out.

Life has been very busy and fun.  I’ll just warn you now that there are several back-to-back blog posts coming this week with lots of photos!  My May Project Life post will be on Thursday. 

Rad Lab On Sale!

I consider Get Totally Rad’s Rab Lab filters as one of the major game changers in my photo-processing process.  I bought it on sale at the end of 2012 and it has changed the way I work with photos for my blog and for scrapbooking.  I even talked about it the last time I was on The Digi Show podcast! I guess it’s one of my favorite “quick and dirty” tricks, ha ha!

They are having a 30% off summer sale right now!  Use code “TRSUMMER” to get 30% off my favorite photo editing program, Rad Lab.  It works from within BOTH Photoshop AND Lightroom!  I use it right from Lightroom when I’m looking at my photo catalog.  It is SO easy!  The sale ends on midnight on Monday June 23rd, so don’t delay and miss it! 

I can’t tell you how much Rad Lab has changed my photo-editing and workflow, and how easy it is to use it.  Oh wait, I can!  I created this video to show you my workflow from Lightroom. I also show you all the different filters available, and also how to save your own recipes!

Here’s my “before” photo from the video:

And here’s the after:

I love the ease of editing photos with Rad Lab, I think you will too! Rad Lab also works from within Photoshop and Photoshop Elements, if you don’t have Lightroom. There are so many options to stack the different filters to make your own favorite recipes!  And the live previews make it so easy to get the look that you are after.  You can take a look at the technical specifications here.

You can pick up Rad Lab for 30% off until midnight on Monday June 23rd!  Woohoo!

The Land of Endless Summer

I could say that summer is here in San Diego.  But it’s kind of like this all year.  The outside temperature barely varies by 20 degrees between 60 and 80 here no matter what the season is.  So lucky to live here.  On Saturday Todd and I went running at the coast.  I ran 3.5 miles while Todd had 8 miles on the training schedule for his triathlon in July.

The store at the beach campground that I always run by.

So beachy.  So SoCal. 

While I waited for Todd to finish his 8 mile run, I went to the Potato Shack and got breakfast.  Todd joined me after his run. 

On Wednesday 6/11, we decided to head down to Hillcrest for dinner and use our Groupon that we purchased for Salt & Cleaver. 

We thought the place would be good, but it was beyond our expectations!  We shared a Parm Garlic fries to start.

Todd got the Duck.Duck.Pig:  duck & bacon sausage, crispy duck confit, baconaze, and orange marmalade.  I had a bite and it was delicious!

I got the Chicken & Waffles:  fried chicken sausage, sweet and spicy bacon, hot sauce, on housemade buttermilk waffle.

All I can say is…. OH  MYYYYYYYY.  Totally worth the extra hours of working out, ha!  Needless to say, we’ll be back at Salt & Cleaver some time.  Maybe not soon, but we will be back!

On Sunday 6/15 evening, we headed down to dinner at Cucina Urbana near Balboa Park.  We had tickets to the musical “Dog And Pony” at the Old Globe Theater.  My cousin Bertha had told me about it because the director is Roger Rees, who played the dad in the movie “Almost Perfect” that she wrote and directed.  She adores Roger.  (You might recognize him as Robin Colcord on “Cheers” in the early 90’s.)

But first, dinner.  His & hers.

Him & her.

I had the lasagna.  It was probably the best lasagna I’ve ever had.

Todd had pepperoni and sausage pizza.  He loved it.

After dinner we walked over the bridge to the beautiful Old Globe Theater.  If you fly into San Diego, you will always fly right by this landmark.

The musical was quite good!  I laughed hard, and I cried too.  Really couldn’t ask for more.  Hope it makes it to Broadway later.

While I always show all the awesome food I eat here on the blog and on Instagram, I don’t always show the reality of the eating…. that I need to workout a lot.  Almost every morning I get up and workout before work.  I do weights, running, and workout videos.  And I walk at work during my breaks.

The bucket of sweat that I produce is not very glamorous at all.  But if it means I can eat the good food that I want to eat, it’s very much worth it.  Just me, sweating and without makeup every morning.

I had to clean up my mess on my craft table this week, from doing all the Project Life pages.

So that I could help Noodle make a happy catdad day card for Todd.

Speaking of the Noodle-meister, I have some cute photos of him from this past week.  I liked this one in B&W.  I was in the craft room and I looked over at him and he looked like Batman, lol.

Noodle in a basket.

Noodle on the stairs, checking on us in the kitchen.

Noodle and I relaxing after I got home from work.

Oh, we did make a fantastic dish this week at home that I want to share.  This is Chicken Udon Soup and it is really fantastic.