Monday, April 29

Twitter

The latest thing that has come about is ClicktoTweet. So if you have Twitter and a blog and you want your followers to Tweet easier about your products and services you can now use a service called ClicktoTweet you can find this service here.


- Testing out clicktoTweet thanks to @AbsoluteAlicia! Loving how easy it is to share. @C_Skillen.

If you have a Twitter account test out how easy it is to use and share my link. Thank you.



Sunday, April 28

E-courses....!

I have signed up for another e-course, The Sea Change Program, with Leo Babauta from Zen Habits! This course is for helping you make new habits and in May the new habit is forming a daily writing habit. This is something that I really want to starting doing and I have been on the lookout for something like this. I don't really like writing because I don't feel as if I am any good, my inner critics need to be sent away and given something to do keep them busy. I don't write much, therefore I never improve. So it is all about to change. My creative hour in the morning before work has been going well and I have even started to wake up before my alarm clock! I am now going to write in this hour and do some art! So busy busy!

Only the other day I was thinking that I have signed up for too many on-line commitments! Oh well I am sure another one won't hurt. These are the courses I am doing; the Apothecary Circle, Leonie Dawson's - Creative Goddess, loving the results of her course and from the 1st of May I start the Manafesting Abundance, spirit led financial planning with Laura Emily from the AC! I have also signed up for another on-line free herbal course at the Herbal Academy of New England. I think that is all of them...

Monday, April 22

Creative goddess online course


I am taking part in the Leonie Dawson Creative Goddess online course. It started at the beginning of April. I was attracted to it as the description sounded just perfect; to get me motivated and inspire me into action and I really want to change how I act and feel about creating art. I am very happy and excited to be taking part in the Creative Goddess Course. It is a six weeks course and typical me I am running behind schedule... I have yet to finish week one and we are already at the end of week three! The course involves meditations, creation and reflection. The first weeks task was to go on a walk and collect things that you are guided to. Then create a painting with your findings incorporated into the piece. I have to confess I didn't like the idea of sticking things on to my canvas! I found seven feathers on my walk; I didn't stick them onto my canvas straight away I used my Gelli plate to take monoprints of the feathers that I had found. Here are the prints that I made, I love how much detail is picked up.


I am going to cut these prints up at some stage and use it on the canvas. While I had my Gelli plate out I used it directly onto the canvas. The Gelli plate is so responsive that it picked up the textures from the painting and the canvas itself. 

It was such a beautiful morning while on the walk I also took photos of things that captured my eye, from these photos I developed a series of patterns. 


The photo below is of a wooden fence, I loved how the light giving it contrast.


These are the patterns that I developed from the photograph above, I really like the colours and the various patterns that I have made. I am going to print out my favourites and include them in my painting.I have been meaning to print off some of my patterns for a while now so I am glad that I have finally be given a reason to print them.


I will post more patterns and some photos of my canvas soon.








Monday, April 8

Buttons

A while back I added social media buttons to my blog. I know every blog has them but mine didn't and I wanted them. So I made my own. I followed these instruction from Projects Around the House and I downloaded the social media icons from Pixeden. I made the buttons in Picmonkey a photo editing application. It is free but you can upgrade to a package that has more filters, boarders and other cool stuff. I was really proud of myself that I made these buttons and I think they turned out rather well. I did learn that it is a good idea to make all the buttons that you need at the same time as it can be difficult to find the same colours, I learnt the hard way and made one of my buttons at a later date and it was a bit tricky to match the colour. I was really impressed with the Picmoney  application that I used to make the buttons, it is free but you can upgrade. While I was taking the time making the buttons I thought I would also follow these seven useful tips from Momcomm.

1. Overall Design Too Wide - I adjusted mine accordingly and now my banner fits just right.
2. Light-colored Links - I have tried to adjust the colours of the links but I just can't seem to change it.
4. Sharing Buttons - Oh dear I did try and add sharing buttons but it didn't work either, so just using the standard Blogger ones.
5. Graphic Elements that Look Clickable (but Aren’t)- I am working on this and if I use images I do try and remember to use links.
6. Hard to Find Contact Info - I now have an email button, click it and it automatically opens an email to me.
7. Cluttered Sidebar - I only now have a sidebar on the right rather than the left and right.

  


Sunday, April 7

Photo a Day

The photo a day challenge that I have been taking part of over on FatMumSlim has totally fallen by the wayside these last few months. I have found myself catching up with the days prompts on mass and doing about seven on one day, not really the point of something called ‘photo a day’. So I have decided to do my own spin on ‘photo a day’. I will still be posting my photos on Streamzoo and doing a round up every month, but I won’t be using a prompt or a list. The photos will be of whatever I feel like or what sum up my day. Sometimes I felt as if the prompts were restrictive. I may go back to them but for now it feels right just to snap away and post my favourites. I have enjoyed taking part in FMS ‘photo a day’ and I would like to thank Chantelle for hosting such a great challenge. Here is the round up from March.