Hotel Europe

Ghosts?

Photos taken and manipulated in phone camera.  Stairs and lobby photographed at the old Hotel Europe in Gastown.  A very cool building - it's called a Flat Iron building with the whole building shaped like a wedge or flat iron.  It was built in 1909 and it used to be a hotel.  Now it's low income housing.  The lobby still has all the original marble stair and brass railings.  The tile mosaic work on the floor was absolutely gorgeous!  Apparently, rumour has it that these may be the haunts of two ghosts!

Brick wall was a photo of a really cool brick wall I saw in Chinatown.  

July 2014 desktop calendar

July 2014 

I skipped June. No real reason other than I was busy and didn't make a calendar. So much was happening in June. Work was insane with our annual recruitment, new members coming into our team, and old members leaving. I've been doing more knitting and spinning lately. Less computer stuff and more real life stuff.

Waiting...

Waiting

This is my Jenkins Lark Turkish spindle. I've had this for a while now and have not touched it since the first spin. Life and other projects came between us. It's light and beautiful and spins like a dream. The fibre is Falkland Islands organic merino/polworth blend. Very soft.

You don't spin on a spindle because you're in a hurry.  Output on a tiny spindle is much slower than output on a spinning wheel.  If you want fast and immediate results, you spin on the electric spinner.

I've forgotten how to slow down.  To wait for the results one inch at a time.  I'm still impatient when I see how long it's taken just to spin this little bit of yarn but I'm working on it. 

Columbines in Gold

Columbines in gold 

It started with a new cellphone and a thought of what I could do with a then unheard of cellphone camera of 5 whole megapixels. It was a personal challenge to see if I can take decent pictures with a cellphone camera. I've upgraded my cellphone camera a couple of times and now 41 megapixels later, I'm hooked again on photography and all that it offered in digital manipulations. The best part now is seeing what I can do on my iPad and phone. Instant editing and so very portable. Apps are getting so good and so sophisticated that the line between computer editing and editing on the go has almost disappeared. When I see an effect done with Photoshop, I think of how I can duplicate the same effect on just the iPad or phone.

The picture above was editing directly using an editing app in the Lumia 1020. The textured overlay was another photo edited in the phone and blended with the columbines. 

May 2014 Calendar

2014 May calendar

April showers brought May flowers. Lots of May flowers. We had a few days of sunshine and was able to enjoy the full magnificence of the magnolia blooms before they fell and rotted.

Photo taken on the Nokia Lumia 1020 and edited on the iPad.

May is also EDiM (Every Day in May) where you challenge yourself to do a quick sketch a day. I've decided this year to actually draw something in a real sketchbook. So far so good.

I'm also going to keep going with the photo a day as well. I'm pretty impressed with myself that this will be the third month. Commit one month at a time.

Good together...

Good together...

Walked around at lunch today, trying to find things that would fit today's photo prompt - good together.  There were so many things. Rain and umbrellas. Moms and strollers. Muffins and coffee.

But the best good together combo was raw fish and rice, all wrapped up in bits of seaweed.  I've said before and I'll say it again - sushi is the best lunch food.

April photo a day

Faux...

I think calling this "Faux" was a bit of a stretch. It's a colour photo edited on the iPad to resemble an old faded photo.  This is the March 31st prompt for A Photo A Day.

I had a lot of fun doing March but I wasn't sure if I wanted to commit for April but decided to go for it.

Purple...

The first photo for April is Purple. A million purple flowers in the city and I do this for purple. What was I thinking?!

April 2014 desktop calendar

April 2014

To me, April is Spring. April is the month everything wakes up again. Flowers and buds are showing up on all my garden plants. The magnolia tree is covered with fuzzy green and pink buds and you know that in a few weeks, the tree will be covered with soft pink blossoms. Tiny green buds are appearing on the apple tree in the back yard.

The snowdrops photo was taken in my backyard, using the Nokia Lumia 1020. Calendar bit was done in Sketchclub app on the iPad.

The last week of February and the beginning of March was a couple of rough weeks. I just did not feel up to making a desktop calendar. I think this is probably my favourite picture taken so far on the 1020.  I love snowdrops. 

Chinatown, Vancouver

Chinatown

Chinatown has always been one of my favourite places in Vancouver. I remember walking around looking at storefronts that you never see open and wondering what kind of business they do, how do they survive and pay rent? Lately, there has been a quiet revitalization of the area. New stores and interesting business have been popping up here and there.  The old rundown storefronts were always interesting but I'm glad to see this area improve. Definitely an area in transition. 

Picture was taken on Nokia Lumia 1020, edited on the iPad using a variety of apps. 

...in a corner.

...in a corner.

...in a corner brings to mind the old saying "painting yourself into a corner." Getting yourself into situation with no or very limited options. Sometimes you just have to bite the bullet and walk out onto the wet floor and hope for the best.

For this picture, this was meant to be a twist on the saying. The photo was taken of a favourite corner of our house. The photo was then edited on the iPad using several filter apps.  I wanted the painted effect and the splatters to say yes, I painted that corner...I'm in control...good or bad.

A few photos...

Permanent food trucks in Portland

This was taken last year in Portland in the dead of winter, right after New Year.  For the most part, it was too cold to stand outside for food truck sampling.  Photo was taken with the Nokia n8, imported to the Lumia 1020 to try the editing apps.  Not bad for editing on the fly but not the variety one is used to on the iPad. 

Windy day on the dog walk

We had quite a wind storm here on Saturday night and the high winds cleared away the rain clouds for Sunday morning.  We were lucky that the blue skies lasted just long enough for the walk. 

Thankful for:
1.  Being able to see.
2.  Fingers to knit with.
3.  Being able to feel the softness of the wool.