Nothing to See Here...

Thank you, Kaitlin!:goodvibes I appreciate that you've stuck around and are still here. It seems like people come and go from most TR's, then come back again and then disappear again! Just as I start getting revved up to begin this crazy holiday Trip Report (finally), I am never sure who is still here. I don't always have time to reply to people, but when I do...sometimes they're gone!

:banana::banana::banana:



DLR Snapfish Photo Calendar Update!!

I wanted to mention that my new April 2012 - March 2013 Snapfish calendar arrived yesterday, as expected. It was raining outside, and the calendar was packed in a flimsy white cardboard envelope that was wet. But the calendar itself was shrink-wrapped in plastic so it was protected.

The majority of the photos I used in this calendar are from DLR trips (some photos I used in my previous calendar; some are newer pictures; and I did use a few photos that I've taken from other locations or around the neighborhood).

Now the "free" calendar that many of us got from Snapfish last year (Michele got one, as did Molly/bumbershoot, deejdigsdis, tksbaskets, Mariezp, Liza/funatdisney, and others I am forgetting) was a larger size than the one I received yesterday. Last year's free calendar was probably 11" x 14" or something? Maybe larger? I can't recall. In any case, it was a good, sturdy, large size - great for displaying those Disneyland/Disney World photos we all love!

This time around, I bought (it was not free) the smaller 8" x 11" size of calendar, which actually fits much better in the location where I want to hang it. Also, I did not get a special Disney calendar this year - I just used one of the regular calendars with the pre-designed Snapfish borders/pages.

Of course, because of the smaller size it's harder to see some of the photos. But it's still spiral-bound (love that!) and made of quality card stock.

BUT...the interesting thing that I noticed is that the quality of the photos is not as good on my smaller calendar as it was on the larger calendar from last year.:confused3 I would have expected the opposite result -I would have assumed that the quality of the photos would diminish with a larger size and improve with a smaller size, but in my case it was the other way around.:confused3

I remember, for example, Liza mentioning that some of her photos looked grainy in her Snapfish calendar from last year. I did not have that problem - my photos looked great, or at least the way they were supposed to look. But in this 8" x 11" size, I can see all kinds of little marks and grainy spots and things. It's weird.

I was going to do the 'minimalist approach' of just putting one or two or three photos on each page. I can definitely see the appeal in that - it's like displaying your photos in an art gallery or something. It's very clean. It's uncluttered. It's a good way to appreciate each photo on its own merit.

But...if I want to look at my photos in a clean, uncluttered way, I will probably just frame them individually and hang them or set them on a shelf (which I have done with other pictures). I want each page of my calendar to be filled with lots of images - like a collage - lots of things and bright colors to look at all year long! I don't want to only look at just one or two images on a page for an entire month. When I pass by the calendar hanging on the wall, I want to have many things to look at!

So, what I ended up with was sort of a compromise: There may be 14 photos on some pages and only 3 or 4 photos on another page. I alternated between minimalist and cluttered!!:rotfl2:


Even though I am not thrilled with the grainy, spotty look of the photos in the smaller version of the calendar (note to self: buy larger size next time around!), and the tiniest photos on the pages are very tiny (you won't be able to see them well), I will still take pictures of the pages and post them here for you all to see...since probably 90% of the photos are from Disneyland trips!

Stay tuned for those...
 
Marie - Now that I know you are about to start your holiday TR, that makes me LESS inclined to start mine, silly girl!:rotfl2: Part of the reason I held off (aside from my health issues and my endless computer problems) is the fact that my other DIS-friends were doing their holiday TR's too...and it's easier for me to concentrate on other TR's if I don't have to work on my own as well.

But you are long, long overdue - even more so than I am - so you should really get going on that TR before your next trip!:rotfl2:
Phooey! That approach didn't work! I thought I might appeal to a deep hidden competitive side but alas i failed :sad2: .... miserably! :guilty: Anyway, please don't let my report keep you from starting yours. I am looking forward to reading yours way more than I am looking forward to writing mine. :rotfl:

My, oh my! You have certainly hit a rough patch with being so sick and banging yourself up. I sure hope you get to feeling better and your boo-boos get all better ASAP. Glad you are okay after both falls. Now be gone nasty infection!!! :mad:

I had no luck finding a free calendar this year either. I ended up paying full price :eek: in order to get a layout like I wanted. Oh well, it did turn out nice and it gives me a smile every time I look at it so I guess it's well worth the 20 something bucks I spent. Hope yours makes you smile some too even thought the photo quality was not as good as you had hoped.
 
Phooey! That approach didn't work! I thought I might appeal to a deep hidden competitive side but alas i failed :sad2: .... miserably! :guilty: Anyway, please don't let my report keep you from starting yours. I am looking forward to reading yours way more than I am looking forward to writing mine. :rotfl:

My, oh my! You have certainly hit a rough patch with being so sick and banging yourself up. I sure hope you get to feeling better and your boo-boos get all better ASAP. Glad you are okay after both falls. Now be gone nasty infection!!! :mad:

I had no luck finding a free calendar this year either. I ended up paying full price :eek: in order to get a layout like I wanted. Oh well, it did turn out nice and it gives me a smile every time I look at it so I guess it's well worth the 20 something bucks I spent. Hope yours makes you smile some too even thought the photo quality was not as good as you had hoped.


Marie -

Well, despite the fact that I think my infection is slowly making its way into my chest (I feel like my airway is a bit constricted and I am coughing a bit more) and I am totally worn down, I typed out a reply to you, AND I copied links and typed descriptions for all the pages of my new Snapfish calendar, earlier today. I had the whole entire post assembled here - photos, reply, everything.

I was about to click Submit but decide to click Preview Post first. I noticed that most of my photos had not rotated or had rotated the wrong way or whatever. I grumbled at the prospect of having to go back and fix each one. I simply did not have the energy for it - I wanted to go collapse on the couch.

So I decided to copy and paste the text of the post (and the IMG codes) and save it all in MS Word so I could pull it back up later and post it then.

And my stupid MS Word locked up before it was able to save the text.:headache: And then, after MS Word locked up, my PC locked up and I had to reboot. So I lost all the text that I typed and I still have to go into Photobucket and fix all of the incorrectly rotated photos. Arrrrrrrggggggggghhhhhhh!

I just can't deal with these PC issues. If I have this much trouble when I am merely trying to post photos of some calendar pages and the IMG codes, imagine the trouble I will have with a DLR Trip Report. :headache:
 

Sherry, I say we nuke that turkey.:hug:

I agree. There are many downsides to a new computer too :sad2: I spent hours adding watermark in my photoshop elements program and then uploading to photobucket only to realize in my first trip report post that I had the settings wrong. UGH. Computer issues are the worst.

How are you ears?

TK
 
Oh man Sherry! That stinks! I certainly don't blame you for being aggravated. I hate it when that sort of thing happens and you lose everything you worked so hard on. Feeling like crude to begin with I am sure made it even worse. I can imagine how daunting thinking about working on your trip report must feel. Here's hoping your computer decides to be on good behavior when you do finally get started. Feel better soon! :flower3:
 
I'm still here Sherry! I'm worried about you...with your falls and infection that seems to be taking over...

I'm very much looking forward to your TR. I'm dying to find out who Aunt Betty is! ;)

I really hope you feel better soon. :goodvibes
 
Thank you, deej! I really hope I feel better soon too - I am not used to this sort of dragged out, prolonged illness. It's odd...and draining (and a bit worrisome).

I'll reply more to the last posts (from deej, TK, Marie & Michele) tomorrow, but I just wanted to try again to post these darn pictures of my April 2012 - March 2013 Snapfish calendar.

I don't know why the calendar photos did not rotate properly but it was not something I could fix in Photobucket. I actually had to go back to the Canon software to rotate them and then reload them to Photobucket. I never changed any settings on the camera so I'm not sure why other photos rotate just fine on their own and these did not. It makes no sense. It's got me wondering if my actual 'trip report photos' (which I have yet to post) will be rotated properly or if I will have this same issue.

So let me try this one more time....


This is the calendar's cover photo - I used a photo of flowers that I took at Farmers Market, then applied the "Painting" effect on Photobucket and added a border to it...

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April 2012...The photos of the candy are from Farmers Market. The other 2 photos are from Disneyland...

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May 2012...All the photos are from Disneyland, except the upper right-hand picture, which is the actual photo that I used for the cover's "Painting" effect...

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June 2012...2 photos from Catalina and the other photo of the gorgeous pink sky is from my neighborhood...

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July 2012...These photos are from California Adventure and Disneyland...I wanted to use photos with flowing water to contrast the heat of summer...

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August 2012...I used a single photo that I took of Mickey's Fun Wheel and applied the Photobucket "Pop Art" effect to it, which resulted in the Andy Warhol-esque interpretation in the center. In the upper right-hand corner is a different version of the same exact photo - this time with the "Painting" effect...

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September 2012...All Autumn flowers from Disneyland! (I'll bet this page is deej's favorite!)...

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October 2012...Halloween Time at Disneyland!!!...

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November 2012...All Disneyland and the Grand Californian. Most of you have seen these photos already, but for anyone new to my TR and to my photos, I just want to point out that the 'clock' photo in the upper left was taken at sunset, while the photo in the lower left (immediately beneath it) was taken at the GCH at sunrise. (Being at DLR when the dawn breaks, in the middle of the holiday season, is just pure magic - but I will get into that more when the actual TR begins!) I wanted a nice representation of sunrise/sunset on this page, for no particular reason!...

IMG_4035.jpg




December 2012...All from Disneyland Resort (holiday borders/effects from Photobucket). Deejdigsdis was the first person that I am aware of to capture that candy cane display on camera, so it was not my original idea at all.

IMG_4036.jpg





January 2013...All from Disneyland and the Disneyland Hotel...

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February 2013...Celebrating love, Valentine's Day and Mardi Gras with photos from Disneyland...

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March 2013...The well-known pub-club Molly Malone's from my neighborhood, and 2 different shots of the old Disneyland Hotel waterfalls...

IMG_4041.jpg




And...the exciting back cover with the thumbnails...

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One of these days I will actually allow myself enough time to arrange the calendar in the exact way that I want it, so that I am 100% satisfied. Although I like my calendar and I like using my favorite photos in it, I was rushed and if I'd had time to think about it I might have chosen different photos or arranged them differently - and I would have added the teeny photos in the date boxes like TK did in her calendar!

But...it'll do in a pinch. I like it well enough, and Marie will be pleased to know that I am fairly happy with it. I like having lots of colorful images to look at year-round - some of them calming; some of them more vibrant and fun. I liked mixing some of my old favorite DLR photos with newer DLR photos and also photos from other things besides Disneyland.

I hope you all like the calendar - again, if you have never ordered a calendar from Snapfish, I highly recommend them! They are good quality and are a great way to display those photos you love!

Okay...back to resting!
 
I think your calendar turned out wonderful Sherry. I hope you feel better.
 
Oh Sherry! I LOVE your calendar! I had a big smile on my face the whole time I was scrolling through the different months! Not only a smile on my face, but tears in my eyes! Wow...I wasn't expecting that reaction at all! And look...every single sentence so far has an exclamation point after it! (And according to my Kindergartener, who is coming along very well in the reading department, you should yell the sentence when you see the exclamation point. ;) So read it like that.)

(Completely off topic...but "Every Rose Has It's Thorn" is playing right now on my Playlist. :))

Back to your calendar. It's just beautiful. I'm not sure which month I like best. You're right, I definitely love the flowers in September. That page is gorgeous.

For April...it was fun to see those Christmas/Valentine's Day red and pink flowers again.

I recognize that rose (it is a rose, isn't it?:rotfl:) in May from NOS. I love the tilt and the background.

The pink sky is so pretty!

("Every Rose" is now over...we have moved on to Cheap Trick and "I Want You To Want Me.")

I love the whole water theme going on in July. What a perfect background for that one, too.

I love the Pop Art effect on Mickey's Fun Wheel. I have never used any of those Photobucket effects. I really need to try them out.

That picture of the Main Street clock at sunset has to be one of my very favorite photos from you. Love it! Just makes me happy.

And of course I love the candy canes in December.

I love that lamppost *ignoring the mask* in the upper left corner for February. The red looks so pretty against that particular background.

OK, I could go on, but I'll stop now. Hope you're getting some good rest.
 
Thank you, Michele. I read that there is a bus-sized asteroid (which was just discovered) passing by Earth tomorrow morning - and it is is going to be closer to us than the moon is. It's (supposedly) not going to hit us, but I got to thinking....What if an asteroid hits us tomorrow? I would like to get my calendar photos posted before that happens...:rotfl2:

(By the way, does anyone find it alarming that some of these close-to-Earth asteroids can literally be discovered no more than a day or two before they come near us? We are literally floating targets - there could be a Texas-sized asteroid heading right towards us next week, and the scientists may not spot it until the day before. ...Which begs the question, if we were about to be wiped out by a cataclysmic cosmic event (dinosaur-style) and there was only a day or two to prepare, would it be worth it to know? Would you want to know about such a thing with such short notice and no time to do much of anything? Or would it be better for the scientists to keep quiet and not cause mayhem? Hmmm...food for thought. I kinda don't think I would want to know if there were only a day.)

Anyway, I hope I feel better soon too, Michele. The symptoms keep jumping around and causing different problems, but nothing is going away. So I have to just keep resting as much as possible and keep my wild partying under control (;)), and pray that I get better soon. I am not used to being sick, let alone for so long (and with some mysterious illness that is non-specific), and I am used to doing things on my own - cooking, shopping, etc. I don't know what I would do if I had to stay bedridden - there is no one to wait on me and help me with those things!:rotfl2:

Hopefully I can get this pesky DLR TR started tomorrow - that is the goal.



Oooh - I just noticed deej replied too. I was just about to sign off - I have to rest and down some Advil. Deej - I'm so glad you like the calendar. Thank you for popping in to post. I have to comment on your comments :rotfl:, but I will do it tomorrow when I am up and about. Feeling icky at the moment. All this crazy, manic calendar-makin'/postin' activity has worn me out!:sick::laughing:
 
Sherry, that is scary. All I have to say is that no astroids are aloud to hit before my second honeymoon at DLR. That's final.:lmao:


Sherry, I am worried about you. I really hope you kick this soon. I miss you changing your photo on Facebook.
 
Hope you get better Sherry.

You calender looks very nice and can't wait to read and see your TR.
 
Sherry,
Thank you for posting your calendar. I started by saying 'I like this one, and this one, and ....'. Well you get that I like them all!

My favs are July, November and December. I think it's great that you mixed in some of your great Disney photos with non-Disney. You'll enjoy your calendar. Each month you flip you'll remember where you were when you took the pics.

If you are a TR stalker like me your DIS friends can do the same thing! :rotfl: I remember when you posted the pic looking up into the DLH Mickey hat. Love that shot!

Feel better.

TK
 
Love, love, love your calendar, Sherry! I AM glad to know that you are fairly happy with it! ;) My favorite pages are all the fall months... October, (believe it or not, even though I am not a Halloween fan) November and December. So which page ended up being your favorite? After making these custom calendars I don't think I will ever be able to go back to just a plain old off the shelf calendar ever again. How about you? I keep mine inside one of my kitchen cabinet doors. I am really the main one in our household who ever sees it but I do so enjoy looking at it. I always end up with a smile. :thumbsup2

I agree with deejdigsdis.
1sm179Firstplace.gif
I do think your Main Street clock photo has got to be one of my all time most recent favorite photos you have taken.

I'll be hoping for no asteroids too!

Hope you are feeling better since your last post and are on the mend! :hug:
 
Thank you, Michele. I read that there is a bus-sized asteroid (which was just discovered) passing by Earth tomorrow morning - and it is is going to be closer to us than the moon is. It's (supposedly) not going to hit us, but I got to thinking....What if an asteroid hits us tomorrow? I would like to get my calendar photos posted before that happens...:rotfl2:

(By the way, does anyone find it alarming that some of these close-to-Earth asteroids can literally be discovered no more than a day or two before they come near us? We are literally floating targets - there could be a Texas-sized asteroid heading right towards us next week, and the scientists may not spot it until the day before. ...Which begs the question, if we were about to be wiped out by a cataclysmic cosmic event (dinosaur-style) and there was only a day or two to prepare, would it be worth it to know? Would you want to know about such a thing with such short notice and no time to do much of anything? Or would it be better for the scientists to keep quiet and not cause mayhem? Hmmm...food for thought. I kinda don't think I would want to know if there were only a day.)

Anyway, I hope I feel better soon too, Michele. The symptoms keep jumping around and causing different problems, but nothing is going away. So I have to just keep resting as much as possible and keep my wild partying under control (;)), and pray that I get better soon. I am not used to being sick, let alone for so long (and with some mysterious illness that is non-specific), and I am used to doing things on my own - cooking, shopping, etc. I don't know what I would do if I had to stay bedridden - there is no one to wait on me and help me with those things!:rotfl2:

Hopefully I can get this pesky DLR TR started tomorrow - that is the goal.



Oooh - I just noticed deej replied too. I was just about to sign off - I have to rest and down some Advil. Deej - I'm so glad you like the calendar. Thank you for popping in to post. I have to comment on your comments :rotfl:, but I will do it tomorrow when I am up and about. Feeling icky at the moment. All this crazy, manic calendar-makin'/postin' activity has worn me out!:sick::laughing:

OK any destruction type asteroids are only allowed to be announced if I have enough money in my pocket and enough lead time to get to DLR since I believe that is where all the Disney Tragic should be at the end of the world
 
Well.......howdy, everyone!!!:cool1::banana:



I have to be honest - I did not check to see where my TR had fallen in the TR forum. Today I accessed the TR through a link in the last e-mail notification I received (which was something like 19 days ago) and it took me straight to the last page. So I have no clue if I had dropped off of Page 1 of the TR forum or where I ended up. I was almost afraid to look. No one else has posted here since that last post from Sherri 19 days ago, so clearly I was not in hot demand!:rolleyes1

Anyway, I was so exasperated with all the technical trouble on the DIS for a while - everything was taking so long to load. I have enough problems with my PC as it is, and that is a big enough hassle for me, so the DIS' issues on top of that were too much for my patience! I just couldn't bear trying to forge ahead with a TR....or even post in most of the threads. I tried to follow along with several other TR's I had subscribed to, but again, the DIS' technical issues made it very difficult. (Oh, and any trip reports that include giant-sized photos will keep me away, as my PC seems to have major trouble with those!:sad1:)

I was sick for a while, too - for a good 2-1/2 months. Finally, finally, finally I found some old, expired antibiotics in the back of my medicine cabinet - not enough to completely knock the illness out of my system, but maybe enough to give it a kick start and weaken it a little bit - and that seems to have helped a great deal. I still feel very tired and not 100% better, but I feel tremendously better than I felt before I found & took the expired drugs!:rotfl2: I am almost back to normal ('my' normal)!:cheer2:

Between technical issues and health issues, I just was not in the mood to fiddle with a trip report.

So...now, I am back in the mood to get this DLR Christmas TR rolling!:cool1: (It's only been just about 3 months since I took the trip, but who is counting?;) Why not celebrate Christmas in March?:rotfl2:) I have known how I wanted to present the TR and lay it out for you since December, and that has not changed. I have my PhotoPass photos to include, too, which can be integrated into the TR as I go along rather than posted after the TR is over (which has been my usual method of doing things for the last few years!).

Most of my DIS friends - though not all - have finished their holiday/Christmas 2011 TR's, so I would assume there is not as much of an abundance of Christmas TR's dominating the TR section at this moment, which is a good thing, although I have not looked at Page 1 of the TR forum so I could be wrong about that!:rotfl: (That was another reason I held off - there were a lot of holiday TR's going on at the same time, or within close proximity of each other, and adding mine into the mix too would have been pointless. There's only so much 'Christmas' the readers can handle at one time, I think.)

But now it's my turn to start the TR!! :woohoo:

During my illness for the last couple of months, one of the last things I was interested in doing was going back to DLR, which is where I got sick in the first place.:mad: I couldn't even conceive of such a thing. Now, however, I am itching to go back!:dance3: Not only are the wheels in my mind already spinning with the possibilities of my next holiday trip and how I could possibly pull that together - I'm not sure about that yet - but I also feel like getting back there sooner than that. Sooner than Halloween. Sooner than Fall. I would like to go back to DLR when Cars Land and Buena Vista Street open, just to be part of the excitement. I would like to go back to DLR around Easter. I'd like to go back to DLR while the Mardi Gras stuff is still happening, which is not for much longer.

I don't know if I will be able to get to DLR for any of these other times, but the point is that my interest has come back! I now want to get back to DLR again, now that this pesky illness has receded a bit and I feel like a human being again. I just feel like being at Disneyland again. Once and sometimes twice a year is not cutting it for me.




So...who is still with me? Hmmm? I know that my friend Mariezp is out there, even when she doesn't have time to comment. Who else is still there? What kind of audience is left, or have I waited so long to get this epic going that everyone has fallen away?
 
:cool1: You're back! :cool1:

I was just thinking about you today, wondering if you were OK, hoping you hadn't fallen somewhere with no one around. I just re-entered the world of TR reading again today (after not having much DIS time of late) and finished up TK's holiday trip. Sad that one's over and ready to get started with yours.

By the way, you were still on page 1. Heck, I'm still on page 1 and I've been done for quite a while. :)

Ready when you are...popcorn::
 
Sherry!!!

Yay!!! I am so thrilled to see you on here!!! You know I am here!!!
 




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