Chica Schmica

I’ve been seeing this here and there and finally got around to watching it tonight. It’s hilarious. Enjoy!

Thank you all for your congratulations and ideas of things to do while in New York. There were some great suggestions that definitely came in handy.

We had a blast, hitting most of the points of interest that we had hoped to. The City is such a spectacle I was in awe during most of my visit.

I have never had so many different, delicious foods consecutively in all my life. Everywhere we ate was absolutely perfect. My two favorite places were B. Smith’s and Kashkaval.

I also found some artwork at the Met that I’d like to recreate in our playroom:

Something about the bold colors and mix of shapes and symbols just seems perfect for a kids’ playroom to me.

But, I’d have to say that this was the highlight of my trip:

Cory surprised me with the tickets the night before we left.

L.O.V.E.D it!

I could seriously gush all night about this show, but I really think you ought to just go out and buy the soundtrack. Listen to it. Dance to it. Find yourself in the characters. And sing as loud as you possibly can with it!  It really is an awesome show and if you ever get a chance to see it grab it!

We also saw Spamalot (starring Clay Aiken of all people). It was a good show, too. 

We spent most of our time enjoying ourselves and rarely broke out the camera. Or perhaps that had more to do with the 30 degree weather and the fact that we were freezing our little Floridian heinies off? Either way, we ended up simply taking in most of our experiences in New York rather than capturing them.

This was the first picture I took:

I’m using their camera and Cory is photographing me. Actually, I noticed these fellas taking pictures and eyeing me, so I offered a welcoming glance, expecting them to ask me to get a picture of them together. The next thing I knew I was having my picture taken with a complete stranger. It completely threw me off. I still offered to take their picture, though, and they seemed grateful. Such is life.

By the end of our trip I had only taken one photo…with somebody else’s camera. The pictures above were all taken by Cory. After all, it is his camera…I just hog it most of the time. I’m realizing this while we’re on our way back to the hotel to grab our luggage and head off to the airport.  So, about a block away from our hotel it’s finally hitting me that we’re leaving and I have yet to take any of my own photos of this fantastic city. At this point, I went ahead and grabbed the camera and snapped about 3 shots.

Frankly, they weren’t very good. I’m ok with this, though, because taking pictures is a new hobby of mine and I only expect about 10% of my pics to come out half-way decent.

Here is one from that set of 3.

There’s nothing spectacular about the shot…just a flashy corner on Broadway. But I love the colors, and for that I have to give credit where credit is due. Pioneer Woman has offered up some of her Photoshop actions for free and, by golly, these actions are the coolest things ever.

Just to give you an idea, here is the before (SOOC):

I used two actions, her Boost and the "Define and Sharpen" action from the first set. I was so blown away by the difference the first time I saw it. Mostly because I’m a lazy blogger and I ordinarily wouldn’t have even touched the SOOC shot. I tend to keep things the way they are if they are at least "good enough." But, since I only had a couple shots in my bag, I really wanted to make the most of them.  Anyways, these actions are tons of fun to play with so I wanted to share the links with anyone who is interested. Here is the link for the second set.

Enjoy!

My best friend from forever ago is having a birthday this weekend and I wanted to come up with something I could make for her. When I indiscreetly asked her for some hints, she suggested I make something that, when she looked at it, would remind her of me. She also happened to mention that she had been dressing the walls of her office lately.

Enter vinyl records of artists from our “wild” days. Ok…to give you an idea of our wildness factor, my search for records included Paul Simon, Bruce Springstein, and (brace yourself) Heart. Originally, I was just going to make a clock, but after seeing some of the other record crafts, I went ahead and did a few more things.

In addition to the clock, I made two bowls and some bracelets made from colored vinyl (above). The clock and the bowls were stupidly easy. For the clock, I used movements from a clock we didn’t use anymore and spraypainted them silver. And the bowls were simply placed in the oven over a form for about a minute or two. They quickly begin to melt into beautifully interesting shapes.

The cuffs, on the other hand, were kind of a bear. They were difficult to cut and I had to continually put them in and out of the oven to get their shape right. You can see the cuffs being totally rocked by their recipient below.

Happy Birthday, Christine. And long live Simon and Garfunkel!

Follow these links for more detailed instructions on making the cuffs and bowls.