Category: just stuff.

I’ve had a couple of people ask me how I add titles, banners or other items to the photos on q is for quandie, so I thought I would just share a quick run down on that with you.  It’s really a very easy way to make your photos look more professional, whether it’s just for your own blog or for craigslist ads.

In general I use PicMonkey for this stuff.  PicMonkey is free, unless you want to upgrade to “Royale”, which gives you access to more fonts, more overlays … well, just more cool stuff in general.  It also means you don’t have to see any ads.  And at a mere $33 a year, it was a no-brainer for me.  But, start out with the free stuff and see how you like it.  You can always upgrade later.

I’m not going to give you a step by step tutorial, because that would likely drive me to drink.  Instead, I’m just going to give you an idea of how I do what I do, and then you’ll have to play around with it on your own (or watch the tutorials that they provide).

Let’s start with this photo.

What did I do?  I added a banner (the grey shading behind the title) from the ‘Overlays’ menu, which started out black but I used the ‘fade’ feature to make it transparent.  I added the title over the banner using the ‘Text’ menu.  Each word was done separately using a different font (Futura Medium, Scripting Pro and Ecuyer Dax) with the color changed to white.  I do each word separately so that I can size them and then place them (click and drag) exactly where I want to.  My blog address is also added using the ‘Text’ menu.  Finally, I added a Simple Edge using the ‘Frames’ menu and changed it to white, then added a Drop Shadow from the same menu.

Here is a tip that took me a while to figure out.  If you don’t want your banner to overlap your white border frame, you have to add it first, save the photo, reload the newly saved photo and then add the Simple Edge and Drop Shadow.  Putzy?  Maybe.  But those kind of details matter to me.

Once you have the basics down, the world is your oyster.  There are all kinds of fun things that you can add to your photos using PicMonkey.  You can also do basic editing like cropping, color adjustments, brightness adjustments and so on.  I also use PicMonkey to resize my photos to save memory space on my blog.

Here is another example of something you can do with PicMonkey.

To create this I used the Collage feature.  This is a “Jigsaw” layout, but they have lots of options, including a Facebook Cover.  (tip:  I also used a PicMonkey collage to create the header of my blog).

Once I had my collage ready to go, I saved it and then used Editor to add the circle, changing it to white and fading it to be more transparent.  The text was once again added in several different sections in different fonts.

I will tell you, I am no computer whiz, nor am I a rocket scientist.  So, if I can do this stuff, so can you.

You can play around with colors, and adding little accents like these pink and white ‘stars’ from the Overlays menu.

Once you have gotten comfortable with monkeying around, you can move on to Picasa, another free editing program that will allow you to make your collages look like this.  Maybe we’ll leave that for another day (hint:  I added all of the text and overlays in PicMonkey first, saved each photo individually and then used Picasa to create this collage where the photos overlap).

Hey, it’s January, it’s cold out, so why not spend some time playing around with these programs to see what they can do for you!  And while you are doing that, I’m going to be busy painting my craft room, and maybe a piece of furniture or two.

(Once again, please note, this post is not sponsored in any way by PicMonkey or Picasa.  I received no compensation, free products or encouragement of any kind.  I’m just sharing what works for me.)

The winner of the random drawing (using slips of paper and my kitchen colander, because we’re extra fancy here at q is for quandie) for a few of my favorite things is Meggan!  Congrats Meggan!  All this stuff will be headed your way soon.

Meanwhile, I’m busy in the workshop (a.k.a. smack in the middle of my piano room) this weekend.  Here is a sneak peek at what I’m working on.

Check back tomorrow!

This would have been so much better if I’d had this all pulled together for my New Year’s Eve post, but hey, better late than never, right?

So … just a quick post to tell you what I am sending out to the lucky winner whose name will be drawn from among the comments left on my previous post, these are a few of my favorite things.

The lucky recipient will receive a few of my favorite things including my favorite color of MMS milk paint, Kitchen Scale, a bingo card of vintage buttons, some blue velvet ribbon, a vintage brooch and a hairpin made from an old button.

Not to mention, the most recent issue of my favorite magazine, Jeanne d’Arc Living …

And, no collection of my favorite things would be complete without some tiny furniture, so I’m also including this tiny dresser …

Which you may remember from this post.

So, if you haven’t done so already, just leave a comment telling me which of my furniture makeovers from 2014 was your favorite and why.  You still have until midnight on Friday, January 2, so get crackin’.

P.S.  This post is not sponsored by anybody except me!

One of the fun things about our recent Danube river cruise was getting a chance to share our dinner table with other passengers.  We noticed that the highest percentage of travelers were also Americans, but the next largest group seemed to be British.  We enjoyed dining with a few different British couples, and one thing that was mentioned more than once was that this year was the 100th anniversary of the start of the first world war.  Perhaps it came up in conversation so often because we visited Vienna, the seat of the Austro-Hungarian empire.  You may know that the assassination of the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary is what prompted the start of WWI (although of course it is far more complicated than that).   Still, it seemed as though this anniversary was a much bigger thing in England that it is here.  I assume because we didn’t join the war until much later.

But why am I sharing this history lesson with you on Christmas?  Well, hang on, I’m getting there I promise.

After Mr. Q and I returned home, we saw an advertisement for All is Calm, the Christmas Truce of 1914, which was playing at Pantages Theatre in Minneapolis.  We were intrigued and decided to splurge on tickets.

All is Calm is based on the incredible true story of the truce between German and Allied soldiers on Christmas Day 1914.  Here is a brief explanation of the truce from history.com.

All is Calm is performed by Cantus, a men’s vocal ensemble with 9 members.  The show is mostly music, with some narration by 3 actors who quote from letters and journals of real WWI soldiers.  The music was incredible, just 9 men’s voices singing in amazing harmony.  Some highlights were when they sang O’ Tannebaum and of course, Stille Nacht, which they sang with snow softly falling around them on the stage.  My ultimate favorite was Minuit chrétiens (O Holy Night) sung in the original French.

So, while it wasn’t the Nutcracker or Mannheim Steamroller’s Christmas Tour, for us it was a much more poignant reminder of the true meaning of the season.  Peace on earth and good will towards men.

It is the classic Christmas combo, but I rarely decorate for the holidays with red and green.

But, that didn’t stop me from having some fun with a few vintage goodies I had on hand.

Sometimes it’s fun to play around with the classics.

Even just a couple of vintage books can seem festive in the right colors.

Best wishes to you for a festive Christmas Eve!

Sue brought this darling little rustic box to the Carriage House sale last fall, and no one bought it.  Can you imagine?  Did no one see its potential?  It was only priced at $6, so I know it wasn’t overpriced.

So rather than let Sue take it back home with her after the sale, I purchased it from her myself.  I felt it was calling out for some finishing touches, so I decided to add a stencil and some vintage drawer pulls as handles on the sides.  I was dying to use my newest stencil, which is this one (and you can order it here).

I’ve mentioned this stencil in a couple of posts.  It says “Family and Friends gather here”, which makes it rather inappropriate for bedroom furniture, no?  I’ve been searching Craigslist high and low for a buffet or sideboard to paint since that would be the perfect piece for such a sentiment, but haven’t found anything yet.  Meanwhile, I realized that a portion of the stencil would be perfect for the side of this box.

I stenciled it using black craft paint, and freshly stenciled it looked like this.

I sanded it to give it a more authentic look, and then finished it off with a little Miss Mustard Seed furniture wax.  Next, I added some old cup pulls to the sides of the box just to add a little more interest.

Since I was on a roll and I had all of my supplies out and ready to go, I decided to do some more stenciling on boxes.

That box in the middle is covered in galvanized metal, the other two are both wood.

There are so many possibilities for boxes like these.  For example, they make great containers for storing all of your Jeanne d’Arc magazines.

Or add some vintage faux berries and a candle to create an awesome centerpiece.

I like using containers like this in my pantry to store the more mundane household goods, like paper towels.

I use this one to corral stuff on my coffee table; kleenex, remotes, coasters, etc.

 These boxes make great container gardens for the winter window sill too.

The possibilities are endless!

Sometimes I have what I think are brilliant ideas for a blog post.  I take on a project, shoot a bunch of photos, and in the end I only have one or two pictures that I like.  It doesn’t feel like I have enough for a full on blog post.  Such has been the case with most of my holiday decorating this season.

I was going to do a full post on the winter window box, but I really only had two decent photos.

It looks great in person.  The lights are pretty at night.  But the photos just felt sort of blah.

I also decorated the Eastlake dresser that is next to my back door.

I picked up the small silver ornaments in Germany and the vintage camera was a gift from my friend Sue.

The vintage Christmas postcard in the typewriter is from 1926, and was mailed from Notodden, Norway to Minneapolis with a Christmas message written in Norwegian.  God Jul!

I’ve also added a festive holiday pop to my Kitchen Scale buffet.

I was hoping to have some more photos to share with you, but it’s been so gloomy here lately that I can’t get any good pictures.

The forecast calls for sun this weekend though, and I hope to get a few projects cranked out that I can share with you next week.  Stay tuned.

If you followed my blog last Christmas, you already know that I have a collection of vintage glass Christmas ornaments.  I have a small silver tree that I display most of them on.  Last year I had a big plan to limit my collection to mainly pink, aqua and green, I wrote about that here (and you can see the full tree on that post as well).

The pink and aqua are definitely still my faves.

So pretty.

I totally adore this little blue one because of its space age theme.

Try to ignore my reflection in the ornament, lol.

But I wasn’t that successful at limiting my collection.  I ended up saving all of the silver and gold ones to decorate my dining room.

And I certainly couldn’t part with some of the more unusual ornaments, like these …

 A few years ago I used a lot of my plain vintage bulbs to create a wreath.

I have to laugh at the countless reflections of my black and white checked floor that you can see in this close up.

So, in the end I rarely have very many ornaments that I actually want to get rid of.  But, sometimes I put some aside for my Carriage House sale.  I’m trying to fill this box for next year’s sale.

I just need six more.  I’ll be keeping my eyes peeled for them at garage sales next summer!