Well, it’s more “slightly cooled” off the presses now because it’s been a couple of days.  The May issue of Digital Artist Magazine!

You can pick it up now for $4.50, a price which is offset immediately by the free product inside.  Check it out.

In other news, I notice that The Pioneer Woman updated her free Action Sets to make the first one compatible with CS4 - and if you don’t have these actions I don’t know what you’re waiting for:  Click Here to Download ‘Em and I guarantee you’ll be happy that you did.  The first set has a lot of great workflow actions to improve color, clarity and there are a few special effects and conversions thrown in for good measure.  The second one has a lot more  “artsier” actions that are really fun to try out on photos.  I don’t use actions a lot on everyday photos, but I love them for the “meh …” photos.  You know?  The ones that don’t really grab me, and then I’ll run a “Seventies” process over the top of it and suddenly it’s magnificent?  It’s like bonus pictures, because I was probably just going to file it away and never use it.

Sharing for no apparent reason:

• reading: Smitten Kitchen - because I need new recipes and I love looking at food.  I don’t know how I ever existed without food blogs.  Or Internet, for that matter.
• loving: Eco-Farmed Honey Nut Rice Cakes with Smucker’s Natural Peanut Butter with Honey - I love that if you flip this jar around the ingredients read “Peanuts, Salt, Honey.”  My personal trainer got me hooked on this PB and she’s ruined me for JIF forever.
• cursing: Nutella - seriously, have you had this stuff?  Tom bought a jar of it at the store the other day and it calls to me in the middle of the night.  A few more ingredients on this label than my peanut butter, but it’s not to shabby on the rice cakes either.  I just noticed when linking to the site that you can enter to win a case of Nutella.  Must … resist … the click.
• looking forward to: a trip to Half Price Books this weekend.  I’ve printed out my “to read” shelf on GoodReads.com and I’m going to try to pick up as many as my debit card will let me.
• in awe of:  this bathroom

[via desiretoinspire.net]

We have very few claims to fame here in Wisconsin, but Frank Lloyd Wright is one of them and we like to cling to those victories wherever we can find them.  So when I saw that the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation had teamed up with Lego to release some of his most recognizable projects as a part of their new Lego Architecture line of products?  I had a moment.  Visiting ‘Falling Water’ in person is on my bucket list, but building my OWN is now on the list.

[via Designbloom]

Falling Water, you are now added to my Christmas list.

I redecorated because my other theme was sort of irking me, and then Christine said “The header is super-cute!” followed up immediately with “And the rest is so beige.  So you.”  That’s exactly the look I was going for, so I can cross it off my list now.  I needed to beige things down a little.  The theme is Vector Flowers from EZWPThemes in case any of you are looking to redecorate your own WordPress driven blogs.

On the Intertoobs the other day I stumbled onto these handmade stamps from lettergirl’s Etsy shop and I was immediately smitten, so they’re on my list of things to pick up before Christmas card season.  And if it seems like I’m planning these sorts of things too far in advance … keep in mind that it’s almost Memorial Day, and it seems like I was just toasting the New Year yesterday.

While I was poking around, I did wind up buying this little nugget right away:

A little hippo charm on a chain by MDSparks.  I love hippos, I can’t get enough of them.  I used to call the boy “Nickopotamus” when he was a baby and now the animal has a special place in my heart.

In scrapbooking news, there are a couple of challenges going on right now that can earn you free stuff!

• a TaylorMade challenge at CatScrap - if you stop by the thread you can pick up the FREE Composure add-on kit and a FREE layered template.  The person who creates the most pages gets Amanda’s entire guest store at CatScrap, and one winning layout receives a $15 GC to Amanda’s store and a feature in her newsletter.

• New and Improved! Challenge at CatScrap where you pick one of your pages from the past and re-do it, using all your new products and materials.  Winner receives a GC to the CatScrap store.

• Warrior Challenge at The Lilypad: “Is there someone in your life that has helped you grow, that has helped you overcome things you never thought possible? Maybe this person has given you the tools for personal growth.
  This weeks challenge is to scrap and journal your warrior and make sure to have the word warrior somewhere on your page. “ Winner receives a GC to the Lilypad store.

The boy has a birthday party today for one of his best friends (although they seem to have one of those love/hate relationships that all kids have with their best friends, where all they do is bicker when they’re together.) Over the past day or so he was complaining about random aches and pains - which is his standard M.O. and we just sort of pat him on the head and say “Sorry to hear that”.  He complains like a little old man.  I know that sounds insensitive, but he’s just a very achey kid … “My back hurts….”  “Owww .. my leg is sore” “My ankles hurt…” etc. etc.  If a part exists on his body, chances are it’s going to be causing him problems at some point.

This morning I found him laying in bed with his television on but he was not watching the cartoons - and people, I’m not going to lie.  THAT is what finally caused me to take a moment’s pause and evaluate what was going on with my kid.  When cartoons are on but he’s not watching them, we are on red alert.  A cursory examination turned up a fever in the mid-102 degree range, and I don’t normally treat fevers because I think they need to serve their purpose - but when I mentioned that he may not be able to go to the birthday party the tears they started flowing.  So off to the store to buy Tylenol I went.

Oh, and I still had to pick up presents for the boy’s friend.  There I stood in the Bionicle aisle face to face with all the menacing creatures whose names always sound like household cleaning products.  The cartoons and comic books will have you believe they’re fighting an epic galactic space battle, good v. evil, but that’s all a clever ruse.  The only battle they’re fighting is the one against my wallet - and they always seem to win.  I had to “phone a friend” there in the Lego aisle and have Tom do a quick survey of which Bionicles are the “cool” ones.  Afterwards I stood in the birthday card aisle and briefly considered picking up an Elmo birthday card just to see the look on the boy’s face when I tried to be all “What do you MEAN Elmo isn’t cool anymore?  Really?  But he’s so cute!  I thought he was all the rage.”  Then I decided playing mind games with my sick kid for my own amusement probably wouldn’t have been one of my more shining moments.

Fever is down to 99.6 as of a few minutes ago, so it looks like he’ll make it to the birthday party.  You know, where he can infect all his friends.  Woo!  The circle of life.

The April issue of Digital Artist Magazine is available now. Yay! With goodies from Designs by Lili, Fei Fei’s Stuff, and Kasia Designs. There’s a lot of great spring inspiration this month, including a Mother’s Day tribute - with a layout done by yours truly featuring my very own spectacular mother. She’d probably kill me if she knew that it was in there, which is why I just don’t tell her these things.

It’s on sale right now for $4.50 USD, so pick it up if you have a chance.

I’m always on the look-out for camera bags for my Nikon. I have two, utilitarian (read: ugly) bags right now, one that holds all of my camera wadgets and another bag that’s just big enough to house the camera itself - and that’s it. It’s great for when I just need the camera - no flash, no lenses, just the camera. However, all of this is a somewhat useless topic because my camera really doesn’t have much of a social life to speak of. I often say “have camera … will travel” but the truth of the matter is my camera doesn’t log a lot of geographical miles in a year.

Nevertheless! How cute is this bag?

It’s the Bowler camera bag from Acme Made ($39.95 USD)  It gives me joy joy feelings.  I’m not sure that it’s any more practical than the small bag I have now, except that it looks like I could at least stuff my SB-600 flash unit or an additional lens in there - which I can’t do now.  But really, does any of that matter when it’s just cute and inexpensive?  I’m not sure that it does.  I definitely wouldn’t mind lugging it around at a school program, but I think I’d have a hard time convincing Tom to carry this one around.  Haha.

As a company we’re participating in the Big Brothers Big Sisters of Northwestern Wisconsin “Bowl For Kids Sake” fundraiser.  Which should be interesting since our team of 5 really only has experience with Wii bowling.  But I’m sure that will translate well on the actual lanes, right?

Friends and family, if you’d like to donate to our cause then you can click here for more information.

The March issue of Digital Artist Magazine!

Make sure you read the Adobe Security Notice that Terri posted on the blog because you’ll need to update your Adobe Reader in order to fix a security risk.

I’m hosting this week’s Tadpole Tuesday challenge over at The Lilypad, so if you get a chance you should give it a shot for the chance to win a $5 gift card to the store.  I was originally going to do monochromatic green layouts in honor of St. Patrick’s Day, but last week Lauren did monochromatic layouts.  So I decided to challenge everyone to represent all the colors of the rainbow (except indigo, who cares about indigo?) in their page instead.  Which really lit a fire under the rest of the creative team, the girls love color!  My dear friend Christine, on the other hand, almost hurt herself laughing when she found out that I was hosting a challenge using color - seeing as how I’m a self-proclaimed beige addict.  There ain’t no shame in it.  Here was my page for the challenge.

While you’re over at The Pad you can check out the $1 deals for today, and in case you missed it The Lilypad was profiled over at The Daily Digi last week and there’s a 15% off coupon available at the bottom of the post that you can use through March 24th on your entire purchase.

We’ve had a spring preview here for the past couple of days, and as much as I wish that the warm weather would last I know that it’s only a matter of time before it cools off again.  The Midwest toys with my emotions this way every year.  Over the past couple of days the bird population around my house has skyrocketed and while I’m actually deathly terrified of birds (or anything that flies) I do enjoy the IDEA of birds and find myself visually drawn to images of birds.  When faced with an actual bird, however, I’m known to go straight into a girl scream and freak out like no one’s business.  I’m an online “window shopping” junkie, the Internet is a glorious creation for that reason alone as far as I’m concerned.  I can lose myself for hours sometimes jumping from store to store, blog to blog, having one product find lead into a web search for a similar product, etc.  In particular I can lose a half day browsing Etsy.com.  This past weekend I stumbled upon a pair of earrings I liked on Etsy and one thing led to another, so I thought I’d share some of my favorite spring bird finds from a few of my favorite Etsy sellers.

A. Bird Earrings by Sprout Studio on Etsy, $26

B. Bird Necklace by Lolita Rose on Etsy, $18.50

C. Blue Bird Nest Soap Set by Love Lee Soaps on Etsy, $6.50

D. Vintage Hand Embroidered Tea Towel from KamiSue on Etsy, $5.75

E. Little Japanese Vintage Bird from Sidedish on Etsy, $12

F. Simple Bird Leaf Necklace by JanieCox on Etsy, $15

And it’s time for another 48 hour sale at {we are} storytellers.  There are 30 new products in the store and they’re all 25% off until Thursday at 11:59PM.

Every plant I touch winds up dead.  I’m the Jack Kervorkian of houseplants.  I’m equally deadly to outdoor plants but outdoor plants have a distinct advantage in that sometimes Mother Nature steps in and gives them a fighting chance.  All that being said, I love to cook and have always had this (insane) idea that I need to start an herb garden.  Nothing fancy, just the basics.  I have two additional things working against me - I live in a Northern climate and I have two cats that I swear have pica.  Really it’s just the older one, but I think he’s teaching the new kitten to eat non-food things.  Like velcro.   :: stare ::   So I need something that will fit on a windowsill.

Tonight I was browsing the Intertoobs and stumbled upon these Garden-In-A-Bag products from Potting Shed Creations.  Love at first sight.  Could it get any easier than opening up a bag and watering it regularly?  It’s as though they know me.

Herbs and flowers ready-to-grow right inside the 3″ deep package, which would conveniently fit beautifully right on my windowsill.  Best of all they’re an eco-conscious company which has become something I consider more and more with my purchases.  Rather than go out and spend a bunch of money buying small pots, trays, potting soil and seeds I could just open up one of these little $8  lovelies and add water.  So I’m thinking of giving them a try this summer, the poor little things.  They don’t even know what lies in store for them.

If you’re sitting down with your morning coffee/tea and looking to pass the time away you can poke through the rest of the Potting Shed Creations site and have a look at some of their other products.  Like their Gardens-In-A-Pail, which would make a cute Mother’s Day gift.  And the Trees-to-Be, I’m curious as to what a Tulip Tree would look like, exactly.  I’d order one but we all know what its fate would be.