I won the Liebster Award and would like to pass it on to five other blogs

I have newly learned about the Liebster Award and would like to thank Too Smart For her Own Good for giving me my first Liebster Award.  Thanks again www.2smart4.blogspot.com/.

Thank-you very much for thinking of me for this award.  It is greatly appreciated and now I would like to pass it on to some other blogs that I follow that I think are very good blogs and could use a nice award for excellence.  Isn't that what we strive for?

The Liebster Award is given to upcoming bloggers who have less than 200 followers. The Meaning; Liebster is German and means sweet, kind, nice, dearest, beloved, lovely, kind, pleasant, valued, cute, endearing and welcome.

I would like to give the Liebter Award to these five blogs.

Clouds and Daffodils

Frazzled Fran

My Daily Jenn-ism

A Writer Weaves a Tale

and Julie Unplugged

http://cloudsanddaffodils.blogspot.com/
http://www.frazzledfran.blogspot.com/
http://mydailyjenn-ism.blogspot.com/
http://www.awriterweavesatale.com/2012/06/15/sandras-writing-workshop-hop-2/
http://juliejordanscott.typepad.com/julie_unplugged/2012/06/novelisttonovelistjuno.html

I think all these men and women deserve a standing ovation for continually showing up to their blogs day after day, month after month and years and years.  It takes a tremendous amount of patience to work at this life we love.

Share the love with other bloggers that you know, that could really appreciate receiving the Liebster award.  Pass around the world and back again.




Here are the rules:

1. Choose 5 up & coming blogs to pass the Liebster Award on to.  Each blog must have less than 200 followers.


2. Show your thanks & appreciation to the blogger than gave you the award by  linking back to them.


3. Share 5 random facts about yourself.


4. Post the award to your blog.





Five Random Facts:

1. Growing up, I would always spread the food around my plate leaving a ring.  I was famous for the ring around my plate.  And I was the macaroni queen and the pickle queen.

2,  I have several sets of webbed toes.  Passed down from Lithuanian relatives.  My son has them too.

3.  I have been known to check every closet and behind every door late at night after my kids were asleep.  A single noise downstairs would have me thinking there was an intruder in the house.

4.  Once I dreamed I could see Freddie Kruger coming down from the ceiling and I let out the most blood curdling scream ever!!  I woke up my ex and of course there was nothing.

5.  If it's the end of the world this year, I hope it goes fast so we're not in pain.  And if it's not going to be bad, I hope our laptops still work and our cars to get from point A to B.  And if not, hopefully we have lots of paper to write on. And what would be truly nice would be if all our credit card companies and our bills could just burn up.  Wouldn't it be nice not to have to pay for rent or taxes.  Maybe the internal revenue service could politely disappear?  Just food for thought.

Turning a story line starter into a short story

Later today, I've got to get cracking on a short story.  I've recently heard about a short story contest where we can win some money.  I've got until beginning of July to produce and send.  It sounds interesting and worth a shot.

Has anyone ever tried to enter a contest for writing or art?  You never know what could happen.

The hard thing is that you are put into a big pool of applicants and who is to say that yours will be the one chosen.  I think these contests are sheer luck.  Are they worth it?

Sometimes they could be.  It's exposure.  Recognition for your work well done.  Possibly a way into the world of writing.

Let's face it, the industry is a hard one to crack into.  Many of us end up going the self publishing route as that is very often our only way.  The majority of us aren't the lucky few that get over night success.

We can't all be Stephanie Meyer or have the Harry Potter success.  We don't all get our manuscripts pulled out of the trash can to be read again and then get a "Yes."

And then there is usually a small fee for entering many of the contests.  And if they don't pick you, you're out that $15 or $20 dollars.  But it would be worth it if you think you stand a good chance of winning $1000 dollars.  It's sometimes worth a shot.

It's been years since I've entered a contest.  I don't think I've ever entered a writing one.  Well, perhaps some poetry contest back in high school and then I was told I won and needed to pay some money to have the anthology that would have my two poems in it.  I never bought it.  Mom looked at the letter and information and convinced me that it was a gimmick.

Then, during college I did enter some juried art contests where I had to pay a certain amount for each slide.  This was before the digital day, back when every thing was 35mm.  But I didn't win those contests either.

I think sometimes it might pay to wait until you have progressed as a writer or an artist.  Don't enter when you are new to the whole thing.  Give yourself time to develop your own style and then you might have better chances.

It also boils down to what criteria they are looking for.  Maybe they want a certain style or are looking for a certain type of story.

But, anyway, I am going to try.

I'm going to use one of my STORY LINE STARTERS for it.  I'm leaning towards the lighthouse one where the girl gets locked in and she has to solve a century old murder before she gets killed.

I'm kind of leaning towards making her go out to the lighthouse for some reason and all she is going to have on her person is her new Live scribe Smart pen and her body and perhaps one other thing.  Oh, yes.  Her mind.  That should get her out of anything.  So she will have no phone, no laptop, maybe just a butter finger and her wits.  And the brains to get herself out before he comes back.

Now, this has to be a short story in 5,000 words or less, so I won't be able to turn it into the novel that I want to do, but I can keep it a short story for now.  After I am done, I will post it here too.  And all of you will know it's  TO BE CONTINUED.

Jennifer Jo Fay

June 29, 2012

"Happy Birthday, Mollyanne!"

It's my daughter's real birthday today.  We always know her date as she was born three days after my Mom died.  Talking about elation.  Death and then birth, full of mixed emotions.

Write What You Love but with Quality

One of my Facebook friends shared this one yesterday.  Isn't this so true?  Every day is a new day to change what we don't like, start fresh and go on a new journey.  And then, we get to do it all over again and again.

Here we are with another day to write down the bones of our existence.  We love to write and we love to blog.  There isn't a big difference between a blogger and a writer.

Both of us are in it for the duration.  The blogger concentrates from article to article, whereas a writer might often think in the longer term.  I guess I would be contradicting myself here.  Actually, both are usually in it for the long term.  The serious blogger is going to stick it out for a good three to five years or maybe longer.
And we're both writers.

Some bloggers blog as if keeping a journal.  There are Mom bloggers, bloggers for every niche and bloggers who want to blog about making money.

But we're all writers on some level and need to write with quality always.

So, whether you want to be a well seasoned writer, blogger, poet, or any other form of a writer, do what you love first and foremost.  And above all, write with quality.

Think about your hook, line and sinker and reel your readers in.  But also, as a writer and a blogger, you always need to practice honesty with your readers.  Be real.  Be true.  Be you.

Never deceive them.  This would always be with your writing.  Never tell lies, unless you are writing fiction.  Fiction is about the only time where you can lie.  But then, even with fiction you have to make everything believable.

Nobody is going to want to read about a woman who goes out all night and doesn't leave her children with a babysitter.  Or about a man who can fly, but then can't stay in the air.  Yeah, he can fly but then again he can't.  You have to make everything seem plausible.

When you are writing fiction, you also want your readers to believe in your heroine and hero and other major characters.  You want them to know them inside out and they always want to see them change in some way in the end of the novel.  There needs to be a well written beginning, middle and ending.

Come to the conclusion and then end it with a bang.

I always think a good element of surprise is great with novel writing.  I do believe that you shouldn't tell all you know in the first chapters.  Keep your reader guessing.  But also, you can't leave them hanging.  Your job is to keep them turning the page to learn something new.  Don't use too many questions in your novels.

Readers don't like a lot of questions.  It's okay to have some questions as long as it's relevant and important to the novel.  But a reader will get annoyed if there is too many questions.  I learned this as I had finished my first romance novel, Lustful Evangelean and my local editor said I had too many questions. And sometimes she would say that I would repeat things and kind of say the same thing often.

I think after writing a first novel, you learn to become a more practiced writer.  My editor had said to me, "Maybe your next novel will be even better."  I think I achieved that with Black Roses, my first mystery.  And who knows, maybe The Glorious Money Tree will be even better.

But, we should be honest with our readers all the time.  Even when we would like to earn money with our blogs.  Always let them know where your ads are coming from if you are running someone's ads on your blog.  Like for me, I am running Linkshare ads, Clickbank and of course Google Adsense.  Which I'm not sure how effective Linkshare and Clickbank are, but I'm going to try them out.

                                                    I have got to force myself to take some time to make some new paper dolls.  My passion for writing tends to take over.  I should do this before the year is out.  Set a goal.


And then if you are selling your own quality items like I am trying to get off the ground, then you need to be honest with all your potential clients that it is quality and that they will receive an item as described, well packaged and with the fact that if someone isn't happy with their product that they always get a full refund.  The customer is always right.

And it is good customer relations to have good communications and  quality service.  You will go much further if you always practice this.  I do this well with my Ebay sales and I have become a quality seller.  People trust me.

That's why also when you are blogging and writing and gaining your readership, you always have to be up front and honest with your readers.

After all, you want them to come to trust you, trust in your products that some might someday want to buy or pass it onto someone who would be interested in the items.

Although for me, paper dolls are a specialty and I knew going in that it's not a necessity.  But there are women who like them.  I have also had buyers tell me that they are too beautiful to cut up.  I work hard on my backgrounds too.  I will say that nobody ever gets the original paper doll.  But all of them are printed on good quality card-stock and packaged in a protective sleeve.  And then if I get a mail order I like to wrap in pretty tissue paper and bubble wrap.  Mostly, so far I have sold them at craft shows and the rare mail order through a specialty paper doll trade magazine.  I did get two mail orders and I was so surprised it happened.

I sold a set of handmade photography cards years ago through a mail order catalog I created and mailed to places.  I got lucky and got one order from a girl in Portland, Maine who had a small hat shop and she wanted some of my cards for the shop.  This was long before we had all this free advertising over the internet.

And years ago, I got lucky and sold some handmade cards through Ebay.  I had one buyer who purchased one or two times and loved them.  But Ebay is definitely a finicky place to sell handmade items.  Sometimes it sells and sometimes it doesn't.  I think a lot of Ebay buyers just want to get a bargain and don't want the craft items.  So, I guess that's why we have Etsy.  But there you need to really do all your own advertising to be successful at it.

So, same goes for a blog that you want to become successful and for wanting your handmade items and business to get off the ground, you need to be honest.  Keep producing quality writing that is going to have your readers coming back as faithful readers.  Be honest always.  Let them know who you are.

And above all, write what you love, be patient and good things can come.  The sky could be the limit.  Dream.  Hope.  Faith.  Believe that anything can happen and you could be well on your way.

A blog or a novel doesn't happen over night.  Well, technically Black Roses took a month to write and a month to edit, but it didn't land me millions or hardly anything financially.  But it was still worth the learning experience.

You hear of the occasional success story, where I would also say there was a little bit of luck that played into someone's success.

And then you hear about someone who had a success story, but it took them perhaps half a life time to do it.  The majority of us wait patiently for our fruits and hard labor to harvest.  For some of us it finally happens.  And then there are those of us that wait our whole lives hoping that someday we become successful, famous,  and financially set.  And for many of us, we end up being all the unknown Van Goghs of the world.

But to be real truthful, it doesn't make the one who got lucky any smarter, more of a genius and talented than the unknowns.  There is tremendous talent that goes unsaid all over this world. It's really too bad when someone is so talented and they end up going to the other world undiscovered.  But isn't it the way of it?

But, I would say it would be a different story if there was someone that was so talented, and chose to be selfish and keep it all to themselves.  Talent should never be locked up for nobody to see.  If you have it, share it with others.  Talent is to inspire.  Motivate others to create their own masterpieces.

We should be in this big melting pot together.

The world is a better place when everyone shares and becomes a well loved community.

Jennifer Jo Fay

Copyrighted June 28, 2012


Yay, my first article today.  I played hooky yesterday and instead was a blog hopping social butterfly all day.  Now, I've got to get cracking.

Next, I should be going to write at least Chapter Nine of the Glorious Money Tree.  I've got to either write about little Sally getting bullied in class or her mother having a scrabble morning with her friend and spilling a secret.  And then Sally needs to talk to Flavia the fairy again.  Last she talked with her, Flavia was flying to China to help a crying little girl.  Sally is going to want to know what happened with the girl on the other side of the world.

Maybe I should also be writing a blog post about writers and plots.  The different types of writers.  I will be honest and say, I am a writer who goes with the flow.  I don't have this big plot that I have planned out ahead.  I do have a general idea.  You do have to kind of know something about where you want your novels to go.

                                             Jennifer Jo Fay Fancy Photography    (I took this one last spring.  I'm due to go on another flower photo session soon.


Two more photo editing places I learned of are:

picmonkey and befunky

It's cool to know we have other photo places online to edit and play around with our stuff.

Cheryl Anne Hutchins

My mom was born, Cheryl Ann Hutchins.  She liked to spell her middle name with an e at the end.  My uncle Gary, her older brother called her Sharyl.  She was the youngest of four kids and they all grew up in a quaint little neighborhood called Redbank.  She was born there and died there.

My mother was humble, never greedy.  She didn't want a big service and ended up just having a graveside service.  As I sat there eleven years ago, looking at her pink urn, it was hard to realize that she had been cremated and her ashes rested inside.

She is what kept my Nana and Grampy from divorcing each other.  They might have done just that if Mom hadn't been born.  I think Mom had been a favorite.  I didn't think she played favorites, but maybe she did.  And it was a blessing that my Nana got alzheimer's as my mom's death would have killed her.

I think my Nana had days when she knew something was missing.  Nobody else thought so, but I did.


Eleven years ago today, my mom passed away.  It seems like lightyears ago.  So at about 5PM tonight will mark the true anniversary.

Eleven years ago, I had arrived home from a false alarm for labor and called Dad to tell him it was another false alarm.  Then he went on to say that Mom had just passed away.  It was hard to take in that news miles and miles away.

My sister and brother were all there.  They saw her in her last hours.  My brother was the last face that she saw.  I sometimes got jealous of that.

I was a high case pregnancy, so they didn't want me to travel during the last part of the pregnancy and Mom and Dad didn't want me to risk the trip to Maine.

I was probably better off seeing her in good condition about a month before she passed away.  And three days after she died, Mollyanne was born.

Mom died at 51, I think.  She suffered from Colon Cancer for three years.  My oldest son, Sean remembers her.  Jake might if he saw pictures.  And of course the girls never got to meet her.

She went through several surgeries early on and the doctors left a margin.  If they hadn't left a margin, maybe she would still be here.  Then she went on a Martha's Vineyard trip with us.

And she was in remission for a little bit.  Then the christmas before her death she told us it was back and in her liver this time.  She waited for Christmas to be over to tell us the news.  We didn't want to believe it.  And then she was just dying and there was no way to stop it.

Dad got mad that the relatives were consuming her remaining days.  Perhaps she would have lived just a little bit longer if she hadn't gotten tired out.  Maybe she would have seen my first daughter.  Who knows.  But they needed to be there.  They were all going to miss her just as badly.  My Aunt Mary washed her stairs for her and did some chores.  They quietly tended to things while she might have slept.  I know Dad gets angry that they were there all the time, but at the same time, they were her family.

My Aunt Mary was almost like a mother and her cousin, like a sister.

Yet, it was her time.  It's never fair when God takes someone way before their time.  She still had half a life left.  It's never easy.

Today and yesterday have been quiet days.  I've just felt like napping.  I'm tired and I guess I need some days to reflect on what was once great to have her in my life.

And now she's gone.  Now, the years, just flow together and it just feels like another year since her death.  But still just another year of missing mom.  It's comforting to know that her spirit is near.

Jennifer Jo Fay

Copyrighted June 26, 2012

Hitting the Jackpot and preparing for a Birthday Party

                                                              Today's pasta salad

                                            My girls on the Tree.  For their special day.  They are irish twins born a few weeks apart in June of 2001 and 2002.  The last one was a surprise.  My ex had his vasectomy scheduled for two weeks away.  Too late!  ha ha.

A cute section of the mud room.  One year, I screwed in a bunch of coat hanger hooks along the edge of the lower part of the wains coating.

One of my small quilts I made years ago and my mother's little blanket that her nana had made.

 The part of the pantry where I keep my food.  Most of my food is in their pantry as I'm here all the time. I rarely eat anything except for a snack at my house.  I've got two canning jars filled with orange peels and vinegar for that homemade cleaning stuff and the other one has a homemade sugar scrub.  I love the pantry.  It's a long skinny room that has all kinds of stuff in it.

Right now this basket has odds and ends, but soon I will be using it to dry my mint and other herbs.

                                   
                                        Here is Julia finger knitting.  She does a good job at it.  She figured out how to do this herself with my tip on showing her the Pinterest picture of someone else doing it on five fingers and she figured out her own way to do it.

Here is what she made.  A legging for her webkinz.

Well, those are today's pictures.  Now onto the story.

Yay!!  I hit the jackpot.  I found a collection of change!  Ha ha.  And you probably thought I really hit the jackpot.  But don't you just love it when you find enough extra change somewhere and it's enough to buy a cup of MacDonald's coffee or a donut at Dunkin Doughnuts?  I do.

Yesterday we were cleaning up the house for today's birthday party.  We've got my Sister and her husband and their three kids coming up and my Dad is coming with them.  My brother and his wife had plans and couldn't come.  Just as well, as that would be a full house.  The girls are having a Pizza Putt party with a few of their school friends coming and the cousins.  My sister has a girl one year older than Mollyanne and then twins a boy and girl a few years younger than Julia.  So right now we are waiting for them to arrive.  They are coming from Maine and have a five hour drive.

So, yesterday the girls, Sean and I got cleaning the downstairs.  The studio or now "the girl's room is one of the two dumping rooms.  The other one is the room next to it that used to be the toy room and now it is the has been toy room and old computer room.  That's where their big computer and the printer is.  And there's a huge football shaped bean bag taking up half the room.  And then there are just old toys in there.

And the studio is now a major mess.  And I have a section for my stuff that I use when I'm at their house.  So I am also a contributor.  But, the girls way of picking up is tossing everything in little grocery bags and then throwing it in there.  What I need to do is go in sometime and organize it a little bit.

So, I got cleaning the mudroom yesterday, and in the corner by their sliding door, I discovered my old bag of yarn that the girls had wanted two years ago, when I had decided I was done knitting for a long time.  It was a pleasant surprise as now I'm going to use it instead of the girls, who left them untouched.

So, I weeded out the bag and found a bunch of spare change hiding out at the bottom.  Jackpot!  I was able to scrounge up close to $4 and went to some yard sales early this morning.  I didn't find too much to sell today.  I did find a framed Vincent Van Gogh reproduction of Starry, Starry Night and I might decide to list it. Found a pair of socks.  We always need those.  How many times do we find ourselves throwing out a holy pair?  I did last night.  I bought a few lace doilies to use in crafting, painting projects.

Pinterest had a neat picture of someone using them to get  a lace effect on a blank canvas.  Maybe I will try it to paper.  I've cut loads of cereal boxes to make a journal or something and I don't know how I'm going to decorate them yet.

I also got suckered into a fun thing in a bag toy for my cats.  Should be a fun conversation piece later today.  Once you get it going, it won't stop.  It kept vibrating on the kitchen floor this morning and Sean came up from the cellar as he could hear it really loud down there.

I also found a blank scrapbook which I might just use to paste in different Pinterest Tutorials and before I left  I discovered this really pretty fabric book cover.  I'm thinking I am going to sew the bottom together and halfway up the side and I will have a little container for my HTC tablet.  And there are small sections sewn up inside where I could stash the pen and maybe some small knitting needles.

And before that yard sale I went to a moving sale, which was junk.  I don't know why she called it a Moving Sale.  It should have been called a Tool Sale as that was just about all she had there.  Not very impressive unless you are a man.

And the last sale was the one who had the doilies.  So we got talking about Pinterest and another woman was interested in knowing more about the site.  And then the seller and I were trying to figure out how DYU was spelled.  And I started to say DUI.  Which of course nobody wants that!!

So, after giving her my last dimes, I headed back to the kids house.  And I got started on  a pasta salad for all of us to eat later tonight or tomorrow.  And my ex went grocery shopping this morning so the fridge is full.  We shouldn't be lacking food.  The girls were requesting Krave cereal.

There was a nasty fight about it last night as Julia got the last of the Krave before Mollyanne had a chance to get any.  And when she discovered she was only going to get four pieces she got so upset and then as Julia was getting into the fridge to get the milk, Mollyanne closed the door on her by accident, making her spill all the Krave.  So, with the five second rule, she picked them up and put her milk in and Mollyanne was still upset so I told her that Dad or Mom would buy some more for tomorrow.  And just as they were calm Dad came home and solved the problem and said he would go get more groceries.

And he came back and loaded up.  As I was finishing up the pasta salad to serve either hot or cold, I could hear him filling up coolers with drinks.

We still have a few hours to wait for the family to arrive.  And we did get a little surprise from Gramma as she has arrived early and is cleaning the bathrooms for the company.  She said she has entered a different house!!  It's so clean and my ex cleaned the floors.

And now Julia decided to finger knit for some photos.  The girls are excited now as they just got a new PS3 yesterday for the upstairs living room.  Before they had to fight for time with Sean for the one in the basement.  They were allotted a certain amount of time until Sean wanted his privacy.

And as the guests arrive, we will all be sleeping over and having a good time like we always do when everyone gets together.  Just add the fact that we're separated.  That's all.  Nothing else has changed. The whole family gets together for the cousins birthday parties too and it's just an action packed day.  Like old times.  Just minus Mom.

And this coming Tuesday marks the eleventh Anniversary of her death and this year it is actually on the Tuesday of her passing.

So on Tuesday, I am prepared to blog all day about her and have a day of remembrance.


Today's Pasta Salad, Italian Style

Elbow noodles
3-4 tbsps olive oil
4-6 garlic cloves (finely chopped)
One small can fire roasted diced tomatoes
One larger can diced tomatoes italian spices
I use the liquid too.
Two or more tbsps of fancy greek spices
Two to three tablespoons of pesto spice.
I used the fancy glass jars (McCormick I think)
A small amount of parmesean cheese.

I shook a generous amount two times and mixed it in.
And to top it off with an extra kick, I used a few tablespoons of the Ortega Guacamole dip for your tortilla chips.

Mix it all together and either serve warm or cold.  I'm thinking in a little bit, I might add some shavings of mozzarella cheese.  Don't add when warm unless if you want a different texture.

And my sister and I will later be asking the cousins if Bloody Mary is going to show up for the party this year.

Last year's party, all the girls and their friends slept over and at one point they came down into the dining room and were chanting, "Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary."

My sister and I laughed and said, "You know, girls, Bloody Mary is a drink."

"No, it's a person."  Evidentally, they all made up a haunted girl and she lived upstairs.  So at night, they were afraid to go upstairs by themselves.  And one girl ended up going home at 11PM.  Bloody Mary was a fun spoiler in the end.

I remember my slumber parties were a blast too.  We never made up a haunted girl, but we told a haunted ghost story about The Monkey's Paw.  My cousin, Michelle told it to us.  Leave it to her to do that.  And then we were taught by Mom to have one girl lie down in the middle and all of us got around her and put two fingers underneath her and we tried to see how high we could lift her.  We never got very far, but a few times we got maybe three or four inches off the ground.

Mom was the one who taught us how long to stand on a can with one foot.  How to drop clothespins into a jar and the one who got the most in won.

And then after she went to bed, one of us got the idea to fill up a glass of water and mix some mustard into it and we had fun dipping my sleeping cousin, Monique's hand in it to make her pee her pants.  Didn't work.  All that happened was that she woke up and was mad that we were pranking her.

And then later on, my sister's slumber parties got a little wilder than mine.  I remember Mom or Dad coming out to tell them to be quiet in the middle of the night.

And the same goes for my girls.  They get loud.  But as far as I'm concerned it's so much fun listening in.  I got lucky and got to have six friends sleep over.  The girls usually can choose one or two a piece and they always get their cousins.

Jennifer Jo Fay

Copyrighted June 23, 2012

Here's the little book cover I got at the yard sale today.  Will be sewing this after this post is done.  After I clean up my little pile on the couch.  People will need to sit down.

Here's the little desk I bought at a yard sale last week.  And then one day this week, I started gluing my photos on them and then added some coats of good quality gloss sealer.  After I dabbed and brushed in some gold glitter glue.  I'm tempted to do more to the other parts of the desk, but the girls don't want me to do anything else to it.  And silly me glued the photos backwards.  You can see the little drawer.  I should have had the photos facing the same way.  And when I was done, Mollyanne pointed this out to me.  By then everything was glued into place and I didn't want to wreck it by tearing them off.

I love these little sizes for my photos now.  I used to make my handmade greeting cards with the larger size photo, but now I'm liking them with the little size.  And I love how you can get nine of them on the page to have more than one photo.   I'm due to print out some new photos soon.  And I might print some on regular paper for my handmade journal idea with the cereal boxes.

Go try out Pixlr a really neat photo editing site

I just discovered Pixlr.com/o-matic earlier this evening.  It is really neat.  I can hardly wait to explore it some more.


I happened to be over at Buzzfeed trying to launch my post to their site and they were having some site bugs, so i couldn't do it.  


While I was there, i scrolled down and discovered a cool picture and a link to the site.


It looks like there is a lot that you can do there.  You can add borders, overlays, effects and different filters.  It looks like there are lots of possibilities.


I uploaded two photos and kind of did some playing around with them to see what effects looked like.


I then helped Mollyanne find the site so she could use it too.  


We were loving Picnik, but they closed down the site early in April.  That one was really neat.  We loved that you could add fangs, blood, and ghost effects there and many other things.  We missed it.


In the meantime, the girls found some other site that I need to find and see if I will like it.  I wrote it down but can't remember that one right now.


I guess Julia has already been to Pixlr.com.   I will have to check that link.  I only went to pixlr.com/o-matic and it looks like she was in a section where she could draw and do all kinds of other stuff.  She said lots of people from You Tube go here to do stuff for their videos.


I also am rediscovering Photobucket.  That is neat.  I want to find some other sites too where you can do cool effects to your photos and then save them to your computer.


Really fun.  A little while ago, Mollyanne found some site connected with the Dark Shadows movie and she had uploaded a picture of Julia and made her look like some of the characters from the movie.


These sites are cool for kids too.  There's got to be more sites like this out there.  There was Webface too, but I didn't like how Webface would have their name added to the bottom of our pictures.  But it was neat for kids.


Jennifer Jo Fay


Copyrighted June 2012

                                           Jennifer Jo Fay Fancy Photography

                                              I love this one

                                            this one was kryptonite

I can see myself later drawing on some of these.

Would you buy a LiveScribe Pulse Pen or Dragon Naturally Speaking?

There is so much software and gadgets out there nowadays, it is hard to figure out which would be suitable for us.  Would they come in handy or just be something that sits and collects some dust?

I have some gadgets that do just that.  But a few of them come in handy sometimes.  Early last year, I bought a Nook with Barnes & Noble.  I've got about 25 books in it that I bought.  I liked it, but right now haven't been reading a whole lot.  I also bought some games for it.  My favorite is Majohong tiles.  That is fun.  But, I would probably rather play the one online that makes noise every time you click it.

And since buying the nook, I have been hearing so much about Amazon's Kindle and I'm thinking it is the more popular of the two.  Oh well.  I'm not going to go out an buy that too.  It would be silly to have two.

Then in the early fall time I got one of those HTC tablets.  I liked the picture stuff you could do with it and draw on them with the pen.  The only thing I didn't like was that you only get a basic amount of colors and not a full range to really create a masterpiece over a photograph.  But it definitely came in handy in the fall when my laptop broke an I was without it for a while.  And it was a neat thing to have by the bedside late at night.  And a good alarm clock.

There were some nights when I would be at my boyfriend's and I wouldn't be sleepy, so I would use it later at night.

But right now it is collecting dust.  I should charge it up as my daughter likes to take pictures with it and I might want to use that sometime.  It does have some nice photo features.

And now we hear of so many people who have an iPhone, ipad or another type of device.  Android.  That's the other one.  And recently I tried to search Instagram online and you need an iPhone, ipad or Android to do it.  And right now, they won't let anyone else join.  I kind of wanted to know more about instagram.  It must be the new kind of thing.  Or actually I am wondering if it is the type of set of photos that you get when you go into a photo booth.

My Down Syndrome son, Jake has an ipad.  He got a free one this year, as he has the disability and he got awarded one.  That kind of thing doesn't happen all the time.  He's always been able to have personal care and other services over the summer or when he was really little.  We did make use out of that sometimes.  But I also liked our privacy too and didn't want to make full use of it.

He loves his ipad and can watch his movies on it, listen to music and other stuff.  My daughter showed me something else they use it for.  There's this kid program on it that has either a cat or a dog or a bird and Mollyanne started recording my voice over and over and the animal speaks for us.  And of course we sound different.  Really cute.

I'm just a regular cell phone girl.  I don't really know what the difference is between that and the iPhone.  And I don't use my phone for the Internet.  I have a basic no frills package.  I don't talk a lot on it.  I did have friends and family, but this last month Verizon told me I wasn't using all my minutes and I could go down to a cheaper package.  I'm all for it.

And Com cast called me for a survey yesterday, and all I could say is that I don't have Com cast anymore and I don't want to do the survey.  I get home later in the evening and all I want to do is watch one of my movies.    I like TV but I don't really need it for the amount of time that I am there.  And if there is a special series I want to watch sometime, I'll just rent it on Netflix.  I do like that and would have that service until I move in with my boyfriend in a few years.

And then there is the other types of software and gadgets that we sometimes get and wonder if we really need them.

One I bought last year was, Dragon Naturally Speaking.  I still have it installed an just have never gotten around to getting it set up.  I think I had to do some more talking to get it set up.  And then, I wasn't sure when I would use it.  I'm self conscious of speaking into something when my kids are around.  I really should get it going sometime.  It sounded neat how you could speak into it to write your articles and it would type it out for you as you go.  I really liked the idea of that.

I guess I should get it going sometime and see how it works.  But after purchasing it used from Amazon, about a month later, I got thinking it was probably a stupid purchase.  I type fast anyway, so I am constantly typing up my articles without the use of the software.

Then, today my thoughts would be if I got it going, my girls might have fun speaking into it.  I should try to see if I can get the software set up on their computers too.  But then, I am thinking I might not be able to do that where it's already installed on mine.  And I couldn't sell it on eBay either because it had been activated.

And then there was the drawing tablets that were a waste.  I kept buying the more expensive Wacom tablets and then later on, after they had been sitting in shelf life for a little bit, they wouldn't even work anymore.  So I sold those for parts and finally I have a real small one that was under $30.  I was liking that but now every time I would try to open up one of my photos to draw on, the photo would be black.  So now, I am wondering if it is partly broken.  I can still just do a basic drawing on it though.

But, now I am just interested in figuring out my Adobe Elements 7 software and learning to draw on that and my other drawing software that I installed.

And I finally figured out how to save my Adobe pictures that I create into a folder so I can find them to upload.  I had done this cool one of a vintage Barbie that I drew on, added hearts and other stuff and then her conversation to Ken.  And for months, I couldn't find the darn image to upload.  So the Geek Squad at Best Buy told me to start saving them to a folder after I do them.  Smart.

And I am suddenly liking Photobucket and am going to create some more cool photographs there sometime.

And now, the other gadget I am contemplating getting for Christmas, but I don't know if I will or not.  The new gadget Live scribe Pulse Smart pen.  I was kind of liking the idea of having that to write Chapters to my novels later at night if I don't want to bring home my laptop and write on that.  I hear that you write with it and all you have to do is later on upload it to the laptop and it is already typed up.  Kind of interesting.

I guess it kind of illuminates the paper.  But then again, not really.  First of all they are ranging from $80 to over $100 dollars.  One I was looking at on Amazon used was right around $80 or even a little less.  Not too bad.

But then as I read the descriptions a little more, I got thinking again.  It needs special notebooks which cost more than regular notebooks.  Then it takes special ink.  And maybe after a while it needs a new memory card or whatever type it takes.  I think a 4GB comes with it.

And I am wondering if it is really necessary.  Why buy something like that, if I know I type fast and can produce anywhere from 5,000 to 10,000 words a day anyway with just my fingers and my laptop?  And at night, all I have to do is write in my notebook and then later type it up.  Which probably wouldn't take much longer to do anyway.

I suppose there are benefits to having it though.  You can take the pen and notebook anywhere you want when you can't bring your laptop with you.  It could come in handy if I was to take it down to the pool this summer with the kids.  I could bring my laptop.  I've done it before.  But sometimes I have gotten down there, fired up the laptop and then it runs out of juice without being plugged in and I can't use it.  They have an outlet down there, but I would need to bring an extension cord in order to use it.

Or if you're at the doctor's office or camping during part of the summer or at the beach, you can bring the Smart Pen but you can't easily bring your laptop.

So, I guess I could be tempted to get a used one when I think I can afford it.

But just buying a stack of legal notebooks for $5 to $10 dollars is just as easy and having the old fashioned pens.  That is the cheapest there is practically.

   I love a good stack of legal pads.  There's something said for seeing your handwriting appear on the written page.  My first published novel was actually started in a thick pink journal.  I wrote the whole thing from Nov. 2010 to Dec 2010.  Then had fun editing and got the ball rolling in February of 2011.

And the majority of us still use an old standard pen or pencil.  I still love my pencils for my drawings.  I'm not completely used to drawing on the computer.  I'm an old fashioned artist.

That's a sign if the times vanishing before our eyes.  Who knows, maybe someday there will be no paper and everyone will have to have access to these modern gadgets.

And then there is my Dad, who came long before the age of the Internet.  For him, there was no answering machines, no cell phones, no computers, no laptops, net books, pagers, no nothing.  There were no scooters, no motorized ones, no long boards.  There was skateboards.

My Dad just doesn't care to have a computer or all these modern gadgets.  He did love getting our old DVD player though, and he became addicted to DVD movies after my mom passed away.  Anyone remember the days when we all used to rent the VCR machines for the weekend and the thicker tapes were our amusement.

Now at yard sales nobody wants a VCR tape anymore.  And I have about eight or nine of them hanging out in my cedar chest, only because they have home movies on them and it would be worth the money to someday get them into DVDs.

Could you imagine no paper to write in?  I couldn't.  It always used to be the way.  I remember one of the old word processor typewriters I had after college.  And the first typewriter I used was my mom's old electronic typewriter.  She used to use it for some work she did typing for a company while staying at home to watch us.

But it might someday be the wave of the future.  Kissing goodbye all the old fashioned stuff and going on to all these techno gadgets.

But there are many of us who just love a pretty notebook to use as our journals.  Or one of those Mead notebooks or the little bound wide ruled notebooks.  It was how we used to do it and it still is for many of us.

But there is also nothing like a nice typed up piece of writing.  It looks really nice.

And when we have a finished novel, a nice manuscript is great to have as a starter.  And of course nothing beats the printed copy of our published or self published books in print.  And with our own cover art, all the more better.

To say that we designed it from the inside out, is the ultimate.

Jennifer Jo Fay

Copyrighted June 22, 2012

US Olympics sent a complaint to the Ravelry Knitting Community.

Seattle-based Jen, from The Magpie Knitter, had no idea when she participated in a knitting competition that she was somehow denigrating the Olympic Games and disrespecting the hard work of the athletes.  The U.S. Olympic Committee, however, felt otherwise and sent a cease and desist letter to the knitting-based social network Ravelry that hosted the knitting "olympics." Now, knitters such as Jen are in revolt.


I read this little snippet and article about this on Blogher earlier tonight.


As a knitter, I would be in revolt too.


I'm sure that the Ravelry Community in 2008 and 2010 had no inkling that by getting knitting competition going around the same time as the olympics was being ignorant to the Olympic athletes.  Good lord.


Okay, so they had an olympic afhagan competition, hockey stick scarves and other team based knitting projects.  Big deal.  I'm sure that the majority of them were sitting down knitting while cheering on their favorite athletes.


Now, I'm kind of thinking, had I been on Ravelry a few years ago, I might have been a participant in this.  It's not disrespectful at all.  We're just being a part of our knitting community.  Which is not a community that  thinks that we like to mock our Olympic atheletes.  


Maybe we are just really dying to have a hockey stick scarf to give to our husbands, boyfriends, uncles or sons who admire and respect the Olympic Atheletes.  You mean to tell us we can't participate in a fun Ravelry event and share our passion for creating knitted garments and accessories?  Even if it is team oriented?


For Christ's Sake, we're knitters just enjoying picking up a pair of chick sticks and cool yarn for something we would like to make.


And I guess the US Olympics would be surprised that we are definitely not the old women in rocking chairs knitting an afgagan to pass the time.  


In today's knitting world, we are modern day women, with children, jobs in or outside the home, with full plates and to add to that we enjoy knitting.


And today, it isn't just the old women knitting.  It's mothers, aunts, sisters, and sometimes men.  Yes, men knit. They used to knit in the South years ago and it's nice to see that men continue to knit nowadays too.


And it doesn't stop there.  Young girls want to learn how to knit.  Teenage girls are forming knitting groups in school or at their homes.  


Women go to knitting groups outside of home.  We meet in local libraries, coffee shops or local book stores to spend a few hours knitting, making friends and sharing stories.


Nowadays, knitting is the new social.  Same with quilters too, or crocheters.  There are so many groups now, more than ever.


But you think way back to our great grandmother's day when they had a quilting bee.  It was their social event of the time.  Everyone worked on one quilt that was spread out for them.  My great grandmother did this.  


And my other great grandmother also made quilts.  But I can't remember if she was part of a quilting bee.


We've come a long way, and today we are strong, and we possess loud voices that say, "We're not going to stop doing what we love to do, even if it ticks off the US Olympics."  


We're standing up for the Olympic team members, because we believe in them.  And we're also going to join in Ravelry Olympics where we're going to make that special Olympic Scarf or other garment for the men in our lives who love watching the talented athletes.


So when we have another Ravelrylympics, I will be participating in this one and nobody's going to make me stop knitting in the event.


The Olympic team members are having their fun, and we're having ours.  DON'T CRUSH OUR FUN.


Jennifer Jo Fay


Copyrighted June 21, 2012

25 Things You Don't Know about Me

I was just visiting Katherine's Corner blog earlier this morning and this was the prompt from her blog.

Okay, so here goes.  25 things that you don't know about me.

1.  I'm from Lithuanian decent.  My great grandparents were from Lithuania.  And then when my grandfather was in grade school, they made him and his brothers shorten the Lithuanian name to Vasniz from some longer name.  And then it got changed to Wagnis.  (my maiden name).

2.  I was afraid of bumblebees when little and I threw out my stuffed animal bunny, Bun-Bun as she had beans in her and I thought they were bumblebees.  Mom rescued her from the trash.

3.  I love pickles and macaroni.  In my family, I'm considered the macaroni queen.  My mom had a huge jar of hamburger pickles stored in the closet pantry when I was in junior high.  I'd come home from school, hideout behind the fabric curtain and eat lots of pickles.

4.  I sewed up my own nightgown with marble bag material when I was in grammar school.  Didn't use a pattern and winged it.  My mom took a picture of me in it.

5.  I'm afraid of the dark and need the hall light on at night.  My sister and I shared a room when we were growing up and we would constantly argue on where the door was supposed to stay at.  We had one of those wooden floors, so we would leave it at a certain line.  Then she would get up and push it closer to being shut.  And I would get up and fix it.

6.  I love country music.  I hated it when I was growing up, but love it now.

7.  I have a fear of heights, but finally took a plane ride last year all by myself.

8.  I hate liver, lima beans and squash.  To name a few.  And then my mom once in a while would cook something using chop suey noodles and those silvery chinese noodles that resembled worms.

9.  My mother had three miscarriages before having me and my two younger siblings.  I had two miscarriages after having my first child.  And then after that, Jake was born.

10.  I love to talk on the telephone.  I have the gift for gab.

11.  My first finished novel was a smutty romance novel, Lustful Evangeline.  Which I need to edit and then someday self publish.

12.  I love all the Twilight movies.  A die hard fan.  And a Kristen Stewart Fan.

13.  One of my favorite old movies was Susan Slade.

14.  My icons are Katherine Hepburn, Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor and my Mom.

15.  I love knitting and sewing too.  And I love to collect yarn and fabric.

16.  I can't just finish one project at a time.  I need lots of different projects going at once.  So then I can decide what day I want to finish one of them.

17.  I love my kids and would do anything for them.

18.  I miss the ocean.  Scarborough Beach, Fairy Beach, Two Lights State park and Crescent Beach were my favorites growing up.

19.  I love to draw and create paper dolls.  I'm thinking my next drawing attempts should be the covers of my new novels.

20.  I love reading James Patterson, Tami Hoag, Nora Roberts and a few others.

21.  Growing up, I loved to read Victoria Holt, Phyllis Whitney and Mary Stewart.  I probably read all their books.  I also read lots of Harlequin romances when I was younger.

22.  I loved watching mini series down to my Nana's house.  The Thorn Birds, North and South, and others. We would break for hot chocolate or international coffees during commercials.

23.  I love to make biscotti.

24.  My Aunt Harriet's lasagna was to die for.  I've got her recipe now.

25.  I live in the moment, go with the flow and just try to pursue my dreams.  I'm not in it to make money (although that would be nice).  I'm  in it to create and to leave a legacy.


Jennifer Jo Fay

Copyrighted June 21, 2012