Everyday Chatting & Waffling {2022} Let's get to know each other!

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Happy Monday, all!

Judging went really well last week with the KidWind Challenge. It was nice to see all of the 4th-12th students there to compete, but also to help and learn from each other. Our event on Friday was cancelled due to winter weather, so our next event will be the state contest on April 2. Happily, I was able to visit with another sponsor of the event... and she may have some grant funding to help with my other youth programs, as well! So yippee!!!

Randy and I were supposed to go to the IrishFest on Saturday with friends... but it was still way too cold to be outside, and the one Irish pub we have in town was so packed that we just kept driving. Ha. Yesterday, I'm not ashamed to admit that we did ABSOLUTELY NOTHING all day. And it was fabulous. Meals were leftovers. We did a lot of napping and a lot of binge watching on TV. It's nice to have a super chill day every once in a while.

We follow daylight savings time in this part of the world, so we lost an hour. My drive to work was very dark this morning, but I'll be happy for more light in the evenings. I do wish our government officials would get rid of daylight savings times. It's just an annoyance at this point.

Hope you all have a wonderful week! :)
 
I have come down with a dreadful cold. I think I am just exhausted from doing too much. Straight from my mum's memorial into a major event for the Daughters of the British Empire.

Uncluttered: If you search for Joshua Becker Becoming Minimalist on Facebook, you will find information. The Uncluttered course also at: https://www.becomingminimalist.com/. He runs them several times a year. He has loads of stuff for free, but there is a tab for the course on the website. The next sign up is in April. It is well worth whatever the cost is. I think it was around $100, plus I think I can offer a discount when the time comes. I am not sure.

Other than that, no news. I am decluttering and sick :)
 
I can tell you that the way the weather has been here lately, it is keeping all of us sick. It was really cold all weekend and then today I barely had to wear my jacket at all. I am so hoping that this time spring is here to stay.

We didn't really do anything this weekend, it was just too cold. Kathryn is on spring break this week and she went to VA/TN to see her boyfriend. They video called me earlier to eat cheese puffs in front of me. I am personally looking forward to going down there sometime soon and hike in Cumberland Gap again. We did that shortly after the two of them met and it was a great time.

Other than that, just working, paying the bills, and being an adult.
 
Shana, I love just chillin' too sometimes. It's especially fun when it's unplanned. Totally agree that we just need to get rid of DST! OMG... Yes, it was meaningful at one point in time, but with technology, there's no use for it anymore. GEEZ!!! Have you seen the rigs those farmers have?!? They plant and harvest 24/7!

Lynnie, so sorry to hear you're sick. Get well soon. I'm sure you're overextended with everything you do and all you've had to endure lately.

I hate adulting too, Dorann. smh

We've got the grands today (and yesterday) for quarter break. Day off tomorrow and then got them again Th-F-S/S so Anne can go to Vegas for Sober Worlds Softball Tournament. That's the one where they took first place last year, so they're going back to defend!!! Very exciting. A little exhausting for Grammy and Pop, but that's okay. We love'em! Of course, I'm working all week and we have to take them into school on Th and F, so Freddy will have to play taxi on those days. Say a prayer and check on me if you don't hear anything by Monday! LOL!
 
Carla enjoy the time with the grandkids.

Dorann- I agree on the weather. Ours has been all over the place. At least with the cold front and rain over the weekend, it knocked down the pollen counts.

Lynnie- I'm sorry to hear you are sick. Hoping you feel better soon.

I painted part of the second bathroom yesterday. The towel rack fell off 2 years ago. Hubby was going to fix it. The holes got bigger. In the fall, he hired someone to come patch the holes...at that time, I didn't know he wasn't going to paint! So when it rolled to 2 years on Sunday. I painted on Monday.
I am definitely too old to climb even the little 2 stepper and paint!

My prayers continue for the girls and the Ukrainian people. They are still safe and have gone back and forth the border assisting.
m
 
Lynnie, thank you so much for the Uncluttered link. I've already read the first article and found the FB page. What I now need is "husband talking points" for him to get rid of his clutter. When we first married, I knew that the full basement and the two-stall attached garage were packed floor to ceiling with "stuff." So we were able to get that tackled pretty quickly. BUT THEN... plot twist... he admitted to renting FOUR storage units. So over the next few months, we cleared all of those out, too. Over the past few years, the basement has once again become cluttered. He has boxes upon boxes of old paperwork. He has a giant tote filled with cords from outdated electronics that he "might need" some day. It's sooo much. Honestly, his clutter is pretty much the only thing we argue about. I need help to reclaim our living space. Oy vey!!!
 
Monday I was out of dog food, so I hitched a ride off the mountain and walked a 5k roundtrip with 12kg of dog food on my back to run the errands and check in on the garage to see what it was they'd done to my vehicle that has been MIA for a full month (14th to 14th when I went and asked what gives). Turns out. The person who did intake didn't write down my phone number. Or that I had asked for a full overview because I need the vehicle in perfect order to take my driver's exam on the 29th. Whoops. They said they'd have it ready for me today, which lead into the next issue- at current under Swiss law I'm not allowed to drive without a chaperone because I have a baby license. My assistant (rightly) gave me a talking to yesterday, as I had given myself a headache overdoing it on Monday, and told me not to be a dummy and ask for help if I needed it. So she came by today, picked my partner and I up and took us down so I could recover my car. I'll need to sort out payment at some point, but the owner of the garage wasn't even there and his assistants are, clearly, not very good at the admin aspect of their job.

I've packed up my books- there are 7 boxes and around 507 books. And now that they're away I am annoyed and itching to read them. Urk.

Things are slowly disappearing from the kitchen, and I will hopefully be able to start bringing some things over to the garage this weekend so that I can ease up some of my visual tension, because y'all having boxes and things lining EVERY SINGLE PLACE in this house is starting to stress me out hard. It's visual chaos and makes it really hard to get the day-to-day done. I need to start taking shelves apart, because even if I get a van to move things, I'm gonna have some limitations on the "real big" stuff. I ALSO need to try and have the desk ready to go a bit sooner, or I will have to go into the office on April 1st and I really don't want to. Maybe it won't be terrible if I do- unless they've moved my dang PC for the 7th time. They keep playing musical desks, and I quite liked being tucked off in the very far back of a server room.
 
breoni said:
Lynnie, thank you so much for the Uncluttered link. I've already read the first article and found the FB page. What I now need is "husband talking points" for him to get rid of his clutter. When we first married, I knew that the full basement and the two-stall attached garage were packed floor to ceiling with "stuff." So we were able to get that tackled pretty quickly. BUT THEN... plot twist... he admitted to renting FOUR storage units. So over the next few months, we cleared all of those out, too. Over the past few years, the basement has once again become cluttered. He has boxes upon boxes of old paperwork. He has a giant tote filled with cords from outdated electronics that he "might need" some day. It's sooo much. Honestly, his clutter is pretty much the only thing we argue about. I need help to reclaim our living space. Oy vey!!!
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I will say that he says there is not much you can do about family members who won't come on board. He devotes an entire video on that. He does say that compromise is the order - that he needs to have his space to keep his clutter, then you compromise on the public spaces. It was much easier for me because I just did everything and then moved my husband's stuff when he left it in the living room. He is pretty easy and has bone along with everything wonderfully. He is a hero.

There is a lot of encouragement in the group and when you clear up the spaces, the spouse and children often fall in with the idea of less is more. It has been very interesting to watch how people work through the program. I have to buckle up and get some work done in my craft / office area. It is light years better than it was, but I can see things that really need to go.

If you join the next group (registration April, starts in May) I think you will be in the same facebook group as I am :) YAY.
 
Sylfie,

Visual chaos drives me crazy too and not having anything in the right places. Moving was so traumatic for me. I can't even imagine what you are going through right now, it must be crazy. Having the car thing on top of everything else....

Good luck and we are here for you.
Lynnie
 
Michi,

I am feeling a bit better. I did multiple COVID tests, so I am confident it is not that. It has settled into a chesty cough though, which is annoying.

I am lucky that my husband doesn't mind painting. He is pretty meticulous, which is good and bad. I don't like visual chaos and it will take him forever to paint something perfectly. Well, maybe three or four or even five days for a bathroom, for example. Day one is washing walls and patching every thumbtack hole. Day 2 is sanding and prep with tape Day 3 is painting coat one and maybe coat two Day 4 is second coat if it didn't get done yet and touch up. Day 5 is hanging things up ( pictures, towel racks, etc).

I am not sure I would want to take on painting a room these days.

Lynnie
 
Continued prayers for you, Lynnie, Anne-Marie, Sylfie, and Rae. Anyone else need prayers? :)

So I got some interesting news from my doctor today. It started a week ago when I saw my doctor about my abdominal pain. He ordered x-rays, which I did that day, and a CT scan, which I did 2 days ago. The scans found at least 4 different issues, including a kidney stone they knew about 4 years ago but didn't tell me about. So I am a bit irritated about that and a bit scared. I don't know if that's been causing the pain and neither do they. So now I get to have another CT, an MRI and some lab work. Not excited about all that, but I want answers so there we are.

I'm scared and I guess I need prayers, if you are so inclined. Thank you. <3
 
We have added all of you lovely ladies to our prayer list.

AJsRandom said:
Continued prayers for you, Lynnie, Anne-Marie, Sylfie, and Rae. Anyone else need prayers? :)

So I got some interesting news from my doctor today. It started a week ago when I saw my doctor about my abdominal pain. He ordered x-rays, which I did that day, and a CT scan, which I did 2 days ago. The scans found at least 4 different issues, including a kidney stone they knew about 4 years ago but didn't tell me about. So I am a bit irritated about that and a bit scared. I don't know if that's been causing the pain and neither do they. So now I get to have another CT, an MRI and some lab work. Not excited about all that, but I want answers so there we are.

I'm scared and I guess I need prayers, if you are so inclined. Thank you.
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When there is a reason, I love being on a prayer list. It would be nice if we never had to, but there you have it!

Hope all is well with everyone. I am doing much better. I still have a cold sore, but the worst of the cough is gone and I am up and around. I have an appointment at the bank today to take care of signing for an organization and I am having my hair cut. After I cook dinner, I am going to a friend's house for a movie. It will be a busy, but lovely day.
 
bcgal00 said:
We finished the new season of Dexter and Inventing Anna. Every time it rains here (a fair amount b/c I'm on the BC west coast) I think about how nice it will be to only get a fraction of the rain in the new city.

So that's my update. Hope everyone is well.
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what did you think of Dexter and Anna? I watched Dexter sheen it was freshly released, was a huge fan. Alexis and I just finished Anna. What a show, then we did a deep dive on the characters it was based on. We are still discussing it. Anna crossed with the Tinder Swinder equaled what we watched today, but the name is escaping me right now. ‘Bad vegan’

apparently Joe vs Carole is starting soon. That thing never ends

central alberta has had so much rain over this winter 2021-2022. Rain, ice, snow, melt, rain ice snow, etc. we were just getting back to brown lawns, and semi clear sidewalks, and we are under a severe snowfall warning till Monday morning. Yuck.
 
Sylvan said:
I've been trying to get challenges out this weekend, to try and get through some of my Austria stockpile that doesn't "match" any of my CT templates. It's so funny, with a CT and a guest CT, I am getting a lot more pages scrapped overall, but it's not necessarily what I would have done because I am cherry-picking my to-scrap list to death to get the right number of pictures and the right tone for the templates. It did push me to go through and finish numbering everything in the Austria files so I would have the "final" files for the book numbered correctly. I was initially naming the files with a C and an absurdly high number in order, but it bothered me so much I counted through everything I have drafted and stuck a file number on it so I could rename the 125th file correctly. 33 layouts to go until I finish the book.
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If you feel up to it could you explain your system. I’m looking for something to keep my layouts for trips organized. I’m so frustrated. That a few years ago I said, to heck with it, what I’d already done of Alexis Make a Widh trip, and decided to start over and go day by day, sometimes hour by hour. I just can’t wrap my mind around how to sort what is done and what still needs done. Same with a cruise and a trip to Yellowstone. I want to get stuff printed. You know?
 
It sounds as though Sylfie has a good system. I am interested to see hers.

Me, I download pictures from my camera and phone chronologically. Within a trip, I sort them by day and event. I use a third party tool to rename my iphone pics to the date taken with a serial number. Then I rename with the event, place, people etc. So my folder might looks like (for example) The first is a main folder the rest are subfolders. The date format causes them naturally to be sorted properly.

  • 20190416 - 20190507 ENGLAND
    • 20190419 England - Arriving in Southport
    • 20190420 England - Family Reunion
    • 20190421 England - Ingleton with James, Hannah and Grands
    • 20190422 England - Dave Playing at the Cheshire Lines

I like to think that I mark them when they are done, I mark the pictures as used, but I don't often get around to that.

From a trip like this, I will often make a scrapping folder and copy the very best into pages. So I would have a trip folder that would look just like this and it would have only the best pictures copied in, along with my journaling. I would also store the scrapped pages in there until the album is done, then print it all at once. It would be important to have the pages numbered correctly for the album, so I would label them by page number right before uploading them, if I was doing a printed album.

I also have a separate set of folder for people, places and topics. For example, Disneyland, or my brother's family. These are pictures that I might love scrapping, but are not central to my family albums.
 
breoni said:
We have added all of you lovely ladies to our prayer list.

AJsRandom said:
Continued prayers for you, Lynnie, Anne-Marie, Sylfie, and Rae. Anyone else need prayers? :)

So I got some interesting news from my doctor today. It started a week ago when I saw my doctor about my abdominal pain. He ordered x-rays, which I did that day, and a CT scan, which I did 2 days ago. The scans found at least 4 different issues, including a kidney stone they knew about 4 years ago but didn't tell me about. So I am a bit irritated about that and a bit scared. I don't know if that's been causing the pain and neither do they. So now I get to have another CT, an MRI and some lab work. Not excited about all that, but I want answers so there we are.

I'm scared and I guess I need prayers, if you are so inclined. Thank you.
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Shana, good luck with that and big hugs.
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FormbyGirl said:
It sounds as though Sylfie has a good system. I am interested to see hers.

Me, I download pictures from my camera and phone chronologically. Within a trip, I sort them by day and event. I use a third party tool to rename my iphone pics to the date taken with a serial number. Then I rename with the event, place, people etc. So my folder might looks like (for example) The first is a main folder the rest are subfolders. The date format causes them naturally to be sorted properly.

  • 20190416 - 20190507 ENGLAND
    • 20190419 England - Arriving in Southport
    • 20190420 England - Family Reunion
    • 20190421 England - Ingleton with James, Hannah and Grands
    • 20190422 England - Dave Playing at the Cheshire Lines

I like to think that I mark them when they are done, I mark the pictures as used, but I don't often get around to that.

From a trip like this, I will often make a scrapping folder and copy the very best into pages. So I would have a trip folder that would look just like this and it would have only the best pictures copied in, along with my journaling. I would also store the scrapped pages in there until the album is done, then print it all at once. It would be important to have the pages numbered correctly for the album, so I would label them by page number right before uploading them, if I was doing a printed album.

I also have a separate set of folder for people, places and topics. For example, Disneyland, or my brother's family. These are pictures that I might love scrapping, but are not central to my family albums.
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Thank you, our photos from the four of us, are a iphone mess, totall. This should help. What is the third party app? How do you name the completed layouts until ready to print?
 
I will for sure update / explain better after work - just got a ping I've got a nom for layout of the week for my guard westies which is fun. I loved all the westies! I'll come back later tonight and document better how I contain my chaos eternal.
 
Such a cute page! I voted for you! :)

Sylvan said:
I will for sure update / explain better after work - just got a ping I've got a nom for layout of the week for my guard westies which is fun. I loved all the westies! I'll come back later tonight and document better how I contain my chaos eternal.
Click to expand...
 
Firstoscartgrouch said:
Thank you, our photos from the four of us, are a iphone mess, totall. This should help. What is the third party app? How do you name the completed layouts until ready to print?
Click to expand...

I'll bet my son's are worse than yours LOL! I have five or six copies of some photos, they just keep downloading photos without clearing the ones on their phones, cameras and ipads.

I use a variety of tools.

  • Photomove: To sort photos into date created folders, it uses the date the photo was actually taken based on EXIF data.
  • Duplicate Photo Finder: finds duplicate or similar photos and gives the option to delete duplicates based on size, date, or location
  • Rename Expert to rename photos or folders. I use this mostly when I am creating video folders.

I have a folder structure to process the CT Files.

  • !!Not Published
    • 20220301 First of Month GS
    • 20220301 Buffet
    • 20220311 Fresh Baked

Each of them has four items for each layout: the TIF, the full JPEG, the small JPEG and the txt with all the info needed to post.

Once they are posted, I move them out of the folder. The TIFFs and TXTs go in a TIFF folder, the little ones go in a little one folder and the full sized JPEGs go in a TO PRINT folder. I used to keep the TXT as a layer or in notes on the layout itself, but it is so much easier when posting to have the text file handy. If I am doing a book, then the To Print file will have a subfolder for the book. Once printed, they get moved to a printed file.

When I have enough, I print them.

All my layouts are named YYYYMMDD Name YYYYMMDD
The first YYYYMMDD is the date of the event of the picture, or the date the picture was taken. THe second is the date I created it.

I don't know if this is helpful, or if it is too elaborate, but it makes posting day a breeze for me.
 
Just a little over a week before I head to England. I am looking forward to it, but I am also sort of worn out.
 
So when doing the setup for one of my travel journals, I dump all of the pictures into a single folder creatively named where I was at the time: for longer ones or ones with a lot of movement, I end up also doing subfolders. For Tuscany I had
Tuscany
/Florence
/Siena
/SanGim-Volterra
/Pisa

Austria was a lot of movement, but I also found out my dad died halfway through so my ability to be an organised human went straight out the window, and it was just a bulk drop into a single oversized 8 PSD containerbin:

277306418_670449327853_2552526629846419489_n.jpg


After I drop everything into the base folder, I create 2-3 PDF documents just called 1, 2, 3, and create ten or fifteen empty folders which have the visibility OFF inside of each. Before I fill in the last one, I make a copy of it, and rename it 4, to save myself the effort of manually making all the folders again.

Then I start from the top of the picture list and divide them out into page divisions, dropping the pictures I want to go together into one of the visibility off folders. This way I can leave the pictures visible, so they're easier to look at and work with, but have a quick on/off switch mechanism in place. The number of potential layouts I can save in one PDF is going to depend on how many pictures I end up having, otherwise it'll go over the size thresh hold. I don't save the WIP- once I've saved a finished flattened page, that's "it" and I eliminate the folder. I've done it both ways, but found I was using a lot of space on something I will realistically NOT go back to retouch again.

I then go from the first folder to the last in the PDF document to do labelling -

1 - Page Number
2 - Number of photos
3 - Shorthand content of the layout

ie 98 4 castle

So when I have a CT template assignment, it's easy for me to rifle through and get something that matches the tone / number of pictures required at a glance. When I am REALLY organised (rare) I will also drop myself a text note in the folder with things I want to remember / specifics I want to be included on the journaling as an easter egg to my future self.

Because my partner has a NO POTO rule, I have two sets of save files, A001.jpg is the publication file, and B001.jpg is the same page without the jellybean for when I decide to print a book out. If I'm disorganised, and haven't pre-numbered all of the pages I've divided out into folders but skip ahead to do a layout there, I'll number the page C090 and keep the empty folder in my PSD list, so I know where to go back and renumber it into the sequence correctly.

Clear as mud? Lol
 
My CT assignments I keep separately, with the folder numbered with the "due date" at the start so I have a visual cue when I need to get my crap together for (struggling this week, y'all).
 
Thank you for sharing your photo organization systems. It's really good to see how other people organize their photos and pages. I appreciated reading these posts! :)
 
I actually organize A LOT like you do Lynnie. Makes me feel so much better to know that I'm somewhat on the ball there.
HOWEVER... I don't have the tools you use. Never got around to grabbing those. The only question I have is do you use the pro version of PhotoMove? (sorta guessing you must, given what you do with it)

I do a bunch of what you do too, Syl. I have folders and sub-folders, depending on what's happening in a given setting. Back in 2014, when we had Caddie for 8 months, I decided to create her ABC book. (her "not-baby book". Working on Hunter's now and he's only gonna be 7 in five days! No rush, LOL) I had all her sub-folders for A-adorable, B-bouncy, C-cuddly, D-determined.....
M-mischievous..... O-outspoken..... Z-zany! GAWD, I still love that kid and she's still all of those things!
 
I really do miss not being active here but it is getting closer to a time that I will be back. We pick up my new laptop next week. They were able to save all my document and pictures (photos and digi things since January last year) from my desktop which the flood water went through. I am typing this post on a friends computer where we are now staying.

Last Wednesday 23rd we arrived in Toowoomba ( where we moved from just over 8 years ago) to stay with friends who have stated we can live with them for as long as needed. They are easy people to get along with and they have made lots of room in their home for us as their two daughters are grown up and no longer living at home.

The insurance estimator will be visiting our house on 13th April so hopefully not long after that we will know what direction to take. We are thinking if we end up with enough funds we will buy a unit in a retirement village.

With being back here in the town I grew up in, yesterday we went out to lunch with my last surviving Aunt to celebrate her 84th Birthday. She is so happy to have us back for now as she has missed us a lot.

It may not be long until you all see layouts featuring my photos from our life changing event.
 
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