Gone away, Gone ahead …

As the lost weyrs began their long journey between, so too has their creator.  I’ve just learned of the death of Anne McCaffrey.  For a moment, all I felt was shock, then surprise to realize that I’d teared up.  Now, I feel a deep sadness.  In my head, I can almost hear the mournful bugles of the thousands of dragons on Pern, one of my favorite places to visit.  I first journeyed there when I was around ten-years-old, along with the original colonists in Dragonsdawn.  But I fell in love with the planet, and dragonkind, in The White Dragon.  I wanted Ruth so bad.  Still do, actually.  I couldn’t decide which would be more fun, flying a-dragonback with Ruth and Jaxom, or traipsing through Southern jungles with Peimur, Farli, and Stupid.  Now, I’m over thirty, and I still feel that thrill of anticipation whenever I embark for Pern.

We will all miss her.

My sincere condolences go out to her family.

Bitch Slapped: My Irene Pictures

Irene was a bitch and she slapped us hard.  We started getting rain bands Friday afternoon, the stead rain starting in the evening and continuing into Saturday night, with maybe one or two breaks.  The wind, however, shrieked, moaned, groaned, howled, whistled, and roared the whole time. It didn’t stop until almost midnight Saturday night/Sunday morning.  I took a few pictures during the storm, but only one came out clear enough to see what was going on.  This one was taken about 7 AM Saturday morning:

I had to take the picture from inside the house because the wind was blowing so hard.  Look at the water in the yard.  It rained for hours after this, so imagine what it looked like later.  The ditch beyond those bushes overflowed, as did all of the others in the neighborhood.  By noon the street looked like a river.

These next photos are of the aftermath in my own yard.  Luckily, neither of my trees went down, but they lost lots of limbs.  The first is my deck, which I took from the inside, the others I took outside.

In the photo above, that limb broke the window.  I couldn’t get any closer because of the glass.

And here is the reason I didn’t have electricity for so long.  The top of that pole snapped off.

Here’s hoping that Katia stays away.  Though, from the looks of it right now, that’s wishful thinking.

I’m back!

Finally, I have electricity, having lost it Saturday afternoon.  Just let me say, Irene was a supreme bitch!  I have pictures I’ll post tomorrow.  I also have a couple of kits I was working on, but haven’t been able to finish.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to post one them this weekend.

So happy to be wired again! 

Number Templates 9 and 0

Here are the last of my number templates:  9 and 0.

Download:  4shared and mediafire

Download:  4shared and mediafire

Number Template 8 and Some Inspiration

First, as per request, I have some inspiration for you.  I used some of the awesome freebies available on the August Blog Train.  I also used a couple of overlays from Bekah E Designs.

This first layout was done with my Number Templates 1 and 0 (0 hasn’t been posted yet, but it’s coming).

See how substituting papers for some of the photos gives the LO some added color?

The flowers are from A-liya’s Dreams, the word art from wordartworld, and the various papers from the following blogs:  wordartworld, Designs by Krista, Dutsji Designs, and Wishing Well Creations.  The fonts I used are Pea Katie Regular, Inspiration, and Lovers Quarrel.  I can’t remember what I used for “eautiful”.  Sorry.     Pea Katie is a free font from Kevin and Amanda, but the other two are commercial fonts from  Rob Leuschke, and can be purchased here.

Here’s one with Number Template 4.  When I saw this tree, I just knew I had to use it!  It’s from Designs by Connie Prince.  I got the papers from Sweet Tomato Designs and  BZB Designs.  I also used my flock of Joyous birds.  The fonts are Pea Katie Regular and Vanessa.  You can get Vanessa from dafont.com.

Now, here’s Number Template 8 for you to play with:

Download:  4shared and mediafire

Number Templates 6 and 7

Here are Number Templates 6 and 7.

Remember, they are sized to fit on a 1200 x 1200 pixel LO so that you can fit more than one on your layouts without too much resizing.  Everything is on a different layer.  Photo borders, Photos, and Shadows.  Don’t like my shadows?  Delete them and add your own.  Want frames?  Delete the borders and add them.  Don’t have quite that many photos.  Substitute papers, or even a fun element, for them.  Be creative.  A template is just a pattern.

Download:  4shared and mediafire

Download:  4shared and mediafire

Retro Chic

Last week, when posting Play, Learn, Create I said:

The last time I made anything even remotely “shabby”, it was an accident.  Well, this time, I did it on purpose.  Y’all know how much I like to try new things.    Still, it’s also got this retro, hippie feel to it, doesn’t it?  That was purely an accident.

So, this week, I took pretty much the same color palette, just making the darker brown a little darker and replacing the lighter brown with a purple, and went retro chic.  Most definitely on purpose.  This kit has bright colors, lots of flowers, peace signs, love beads, and plaids.

Unlike Play, Learn, Create, Retro Chic is not a brag kit.  It is 800 x 800 pixels.

Retro Chic contains:

• 16 papers
• 14 frames
• 24 flowers
• 7 love bead dangles
• 7 peace signs
• 7 sequins
• 7 glitter tiles
• 5 journal blocks
• 3 wordarts
• 1 rainbow
• 1 alpha (upper- and lowercase letters, numbers, and some symbols)

The font for the alpha is Ayosmonika. You can download it from dafont.com.  All other fonts used in the creation of this kit are from Blue Vinyl Fonts (you can also get them at dafont.com).  They are:  60s Chic for the journal blocks, Pandamonium for the flower frames, and Giant Head for the wordarts.  Also, if you’re interested, the title font on the preview is Chick.  You can get it at dafont.com or Fontalicious.

Download:  4shared and mediafire

Number Template 05, a Layout, and a Sneak Peak

Last week, someone asked if I could post some inspiration for all the numbers.  Well, I don’t have the time to do all of them, but I’ll try to do some of them.  Today, I have a cute layout with number 3.  To show the versatility of my numbers, I substituted papers for some of the photos and borders, and pasted the entire number on a scraplifted layout.  This is the LO I scraplifted.  Now here’s mine:

The kit I used was my own Play, Learn, Create.

See what I mean?  Don’t be limited to just the numbers.  Use your imagination.  Everything is on a different layer.  Delete my drop shadows, if you want, and apply your own.  Substitute papers for photos, frames for the borders.  Whatever you want.  Do what works for you.  What fits you and your photos.

Here’s number 5 for you to play with:

Download:  4shared and mediafire

And here’s a little peak at coming attractions:

Number Template 04

Here’s the 4 in my Number Template series.  I thought these would be an excellent addition to your P365 layouts.  They’re also perfect for birthdays and anniversaries.  Or, at the end of the year, you could make a New Year’s layout with a huge 2011.  I’m sure y’all can think of a lot more awesome uses for these.  I’d love to see what you do with them.

The numbers will be sized to fit a 1200 x 1200 pixel page.  That way, you can fit more than one on a conventionally sized LO.

The zip file contains the layered template in three formats:  .psp (Paint Shop Pro), .psd (Photoshop), and .xcf (GIMP).  All drop shadows are on separate layers.

Download:  4shared and mediafire

Play, Learn, Create and Number Template 3

The last time I made anything even remotely “shabby”, it was an accident.  Well, this time, I did it on purpose.  Y’all know how much I like to try new things.    Still, it’s also got this retro, hippie feel to it, doesn’t it?  That was purely an accident.

Play, Learn, Create is perfect for those photos of the kids drawing or coloring and magic marker messes.  Not to mention, all of those first day of school pictures that will be taken next month.

This one, like Beach Party and Ginger Village, is a brag kit.  All of the papers are 1800 x 1200 pixels and the elements are sized accordingly.

Play, Learn, Create contains:

• 16 papers
• 12 flowers
• 12 labels (one is blank)
• 24 glitter accents
• 6 crayons
• 6 magic markers (tops are separate)
• 6 glitter jars
• 6 stitched stars
• 6 glitter tiles
• 6 tabs
• 6 ric-rac
• 6 sequins
• 6 frames
• 3 curled ribbons
• 3 glue sticks
• 3 pencils
• 3 sheets notepaper
• 1 sheet graph paper
• 1 ruler (6 inches)
• 1 paperclip
• 1 staple
• 1 piece of Scotch tape
• 1 alpha (upper- and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols)

The alpha and the labels were made using the font Pussycat.  Dirty Flamingo is the font on the glue sticks, and Pea Faith Dots on the magic markers.  You can download the first two from dafont.com and Pea Faith Dots from Kevin and Amanda.

I made the glue sticks by following this tutorial:  Glue Stick.  If you want to give it a try, there’s also an excellent tute for drawing a highlighter pen on the same site.

Download:  4shared and mediafire

Also, here’s the third template in my number series, perfect for birthday and anniversary layouts.  Or for the front page of your P365 scrapbook.  They all come in .psp (Paint Shop Pro), .psd (Photoshop), and .xcf (GIMP) formats.  All are sized to fit on a page 1200 x 1200 pixels so you can fit more than one number on a conventionally sized layout.

Download:  4shared and mediafire