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Correction: Photo was posted on FB by Love Scotland, not the name I mentioned. I also grabbed a pic by Mark Hewer that I plan to use for a layout. The image comes from Mark Hewer Photography, and I saw it on FB. It looks so inviting. Would love to visit there. It's a 12th century castle that is still inhabited! Owned by a descendant of Clan Malcolm. Here in Canada, if a building is 40 or 50 years old, it well might get torn down. The gate posts entrance was used in Skyfall, as James Bond's childhood home, were modelled on these.

I don't remember how I got interested in tatting in my teens but I did. I asked my Aunt who was great at crocheting and many other crafts if she tatted. She said no but her Aunt had tried to teach her when she was about my age, but said Aunt Stella finally threw up her hands and said she made more knot mistakes than Aunt Stella could undo. I talked Aunt Stella into showing me how to do it, and bought a how to book. When I picked up on it pretty good, Aunt Stella gave me the tatting shuttle that was her Mothers. That would be my Great Grandmother's. I used it for a long time and then it broke. I still have it wrapped up in my jewelry box with a note saying who it belonged to. I haven't done any tatting in a few years, partly because no one I know would have any interest in what I created. Here is a butterfly I tatted for my Sister.

No horses over here! The only place where I could see a horse was on the weekly cattle market on my way to and from school. At that point in time there was still a cattle market in the center of Rotterdam! When I was in elementary thé thing to collect were sugar packets and I think I just went along because it was fun to exchange the double ones and those from abroad where the rarest you could have. My 3 aunties were already travelling abroad and brought back lots of them because they didn't used sugar in their coffee or tea😉. The sugar packets are long gone but the hobby that always has been a part of my life is photography. It must be in the genes, my dad was a keen amateur photographer and made me enthousiast as well. For this layout I used a couple of Anna Aspnes goodies, the font is Gill Sans MT and I made the aperture of a cameralens to substitute the letters O in the title. I used black, gray, white and a bit yellow to make the background in honor of the old photos!

I love this layout as well as the story. I too left photography for holidays only when I quit working in the photo business (as a photo lab supervisor), it was too expensive. It wasnt until I was doing warm/hot glass work and silversmithing that I needed to get a record of what I was doing that it revived. And then I really found my passion when i joined the Campus and needed to have photos for layouts.

This is so neat. I was never good any kind of needle or crochet/knitting works. I'd be begging you to make my snowflakes for my tree. I have crochet ones from my mom and I love them. She tried to teach me crochet but I'm a lefty and it was hopeless. Later, I would learn how to bead crochet and make bead crochet necklaces with sterling silver endcaps/clasps.

Love this! The touch of the photo apertures as letters works so well!

I too bit the bullet and downloaded what I wanted. Now I'm looking at a very deep rabbit hole to disappear into! Oh my!

@Donna Sillia OK - bought the RasterToMask Script. Saved my MultiLayerMask and converted it to a mask with that script and saved the script. Called the script forward into a layout and this is what I came up with using the mask from the saved masks.

Susan, it's good to break the rules occasionally, right? 😂

I don't know this Adamski Effect either, Julie, but I am already curious and want to learn about it and try it someday. 🙂 Your layout might not be like the others ( I still have to check them), but I like what you did very much!

I just picked this one to comment on, but all calendar layouts are beautiful, Susan! You put a lot of work into it, and it paid off. The dark ton of the pages just fit the photos perfectly.

Beautiful layout, Julie. The detail of the poppy flower and the red element over the soldier is very touching.

Wow, great work, Donna!

My friends just moved to Scotland and they said there is castles everywhere and ruins that you can go walk around for free. If you look on a map they are in Nairn right across the land to the coast on the the other side from the castle. I wonder how far that is. I really like the elk (?) statues. Can you imagine wandering around that castle?

That's wonderful news. They will be all toasty warm and you wont have to worry about them. I'd say they must be the cutest black blobs ever!

The one on the left is mine; the other is my upstairs neighbor. Yes, they use the Cabin. Batman slithers out in the morning all covered with straw! Sometimes, if all the littles get in there, Batman sleeps on the doormat. I've seen a large pileup of "black blobs" where they're all cuddling there. 😄 He's their mentor and probably the Baby Daddy from before he was neutered. I hear I'm getting a heated floor for the cabin for Christmas! There's a plug right behind it. I think it keeps the heat a little over 40F/4.4C to keep it comfy.

Week 43 Started with a PSP floral pattern, turned it gray and did a high pass sharpen and added noise. Then added a gradient paper above and used a blend mode and lowered the opacity. The vectors are all filled with the pattern, cass-steel, and I added a tiny bevel and shadow on all. Fonts are Dustin Hunk and Arial (CF and Windows).

Using my new layered mask for another picture and layout.

This picture reminds me of a visit to Scotland many years ago now. In Scotland as well as in England there are so many castles and a lot are still inhabited, some even by descendants of the family that build the castle in the first place. Others are now owned by the National Trust, some are restored and they are open to the public. Some are even free to visit and for others you have to pay an entrance fee. I would love to go back there and take photos.

I took crochet lessons in my 20s and ended up with many shawls and afghan blankets. I don't sew, knit, tat, or do anything like that since then.

I wish I could move to Scotland!

That's what I'm worried about. That it wont feel like Christmas and I'll regret it. I agree, it's so much work to put out and the same amount to put back. That's why I like to get it out early, so it feels like all the energy is worth it.

I might need to borrow your stick! Glad to hear you took advantage. Reminds of of the old Ikea commercial where a woman is running out the store. She thinks she's gotten a "steal" of a deal and she's running and yelling, "start the car, start the car." (to make quick get away before she's found out).

YIKES! Thank you for noticing. I would not have noticed it. Even though i've looked at many times. The funny part is when i started posting them, I wondered how many spelling mistakes will come to light. Thanks again, for having my back and for your kind words (that made me very happy).

This is a screenshot of my multi-layer mask pspimage

Playing around again. @Donna Sillia you inspired me to create a multi-layer mask also. This is what I came up with

That poem is appreciated by we cat lovers! Love those faces.

Wow, beautiful! Gee, I didn't know we were allowed to have the light source on the top right... 😉❤️

Template 258 by Lady 22. Photos taken in August, Sandbridge, VA.

Background paper by Jessica Dunn, Into the Woods, Grey Wood Paper, 142072. Paw prints by Janet Kemp, 98588, small doodle shape mask template 038. Everything else is mine, except the poem.

November I think this is the darkest one and will look really dark as a jpg.

September This is a gradient, can you believe it? It actually looks like a light shining down on a wall. I did use a blend mode of various versions of this gradient, which I'm sure I had to stretch and pull and contort in some way.

Susan that is an impressive calendar and I agree with you that the colors of the flowers more or less dictate the background colors. It was the same with my mushrooms. All the quotes are a nice touch and I thought of doing that too but decided against it because I have my calendars in 3 languages and that was a bit too much work and searching to get that done.

Playing with Vision FX again. Started with the picture of the Smokey Mountains and asked for a gold dragon and castles in the hills.

Yes, you always measure at the highest point of the withers. Almost all equestrian discipline classes, especially showing, whether leading rein or ridden are categorized by height. Such as section A,B,C or D. Particularly in Wales and UK. Section A Welsh pony maximum height 12h. Section B Welsh pony maximum 13.2h. Then you have the Welsh cob Section. Regardless of the breed, anywhere in the world, a pony is under 14.2h, and a horse is over 14.2h

June One for the light lovers!

April See how dark I went, I think there is even a darker one coming. I don't think this would print well, it would get darker and I wouldn't like that.

I liked horses too (still do) but I never had one nor did much in the way of being around them (except riding the ponies at the fall fair). When I was about 8 or so, someone brought a horse to a field nearby and we kids got to try a ride. I got thrown off pretty fast but landed safely. Not a great start to a horsey career.

January

...and did the measurement go up to the withers only? I remember measuring horses (warmbloods) for some kind of registry.

With all due respect, were you 5ft tall or the pony/horse? As horses are measured in hands. 4 inches is a hand. A pony is under 14.2h, anything over 14.2h is a horse.

Nov/11/2024 is Veterans Day in the United states and I made this. The background if from digitalscrapbook. The flag is from one of my photos. The part in the middle was adjusted from one I got on the internet.

Hello everyone. I haven't taken this one, so I can't wait to see what I learn.

It's actually a plug in Julie, so it inserted itself into my current PSP 2023. I do have the search bar and use it, but totally forgot to use it that night...it was late and I was running on about 4-5 hours of sleep.

Did you do a Search with the Windows search box on the taskbar? Press Win Key to access if it isn't there now.

Thank you. I also have PSP2023 Ultimate. It's CorelDRAW that's the real lure here for me.

You can download what you want and leave what you don't want. For example, although I grabbed the license key for PSP2023, I didn't download it, since I already have the Ultimate version. I will just use the key to gift the program to someone, at some point.

I found them thanks to your directions. Thanks for the info about the GPU. I believe mine has only 12 GB, have to the ask the hubby when he gets home, he's the techy in the house.

The Vision FX is a plugin for 64 bit versions of PSP. You can find it in the Effects drop down menu under plugins.( If you do not have a picture open it will be grayed out). When it is requested a screen opens to recommend that up set it up with your GPU (if one is installed on the computer). The HDR FX also appears to be accessed from this section of the plugin menu. Going to search for the help files now. To use a GPU with Vision FX it needs to have more than 12Gb of VRAM (is that a top of the range GPU as mine only has 4Gb and will not work)

I'm old school too and downloaded PDf for one of them, I'll be looking for the other one too. Hey, did Vision FX show up on your desktop like all the rest? Mine did not. Not even in my start menu, when I looked at the apps and features section where you Uninstall apps/programs and it was there. But I have no idea where it is to open it.