Caleb is 6 months old!

We can hardly believe it, but Caleb is 6 months old already! Here's a little clip of him rolling, his latest trick :) Turn up the volume, he has another treat in there for you too.

personalized mug template

If you've ever tried to make an insert for your personalized travel mug, you may know that it's a bit tricky... I did a lot of searching, but finally came up with this template; since it took me so long to find, I thought I'd share it with you... (they used to have some on starbucks.com, but I couldn't seem to find them anymore...). This site has some fun printable inserts, or, I am using the template to create my own collage for my bride-to-be friend that I am the "best woman" in the wedding for. I don't think she reads my blog... but if you're reading this Nicky, act surprised! ;o)

[editors update: since this is the most viewed page from google search engines, I thought it would be prudent to list the link that my sister gave me in the comments section... the actual starbucks mug template is here. Hope that helps!]

2012 update: seems those links are defunct now as well, but since I still get thousands of hits on this post, here are a couple more links that I hope stay current for ya! :)
http://www.theshaffers.org/announcements/starbucks-templates/
http://www.snapfish.com/snapfish/tumbler
http://makeitblog.com/downloads/starbucks-16-oz-photo-tumbler-template/

It's not a lie, it's just irrelevant

Whole grain popcorn? As oppose to what? Refined popping corn meal?

High Dynamic Range (HDR) Photography

I first discovered a digital photographing technique called "high dynamic range (HDR) photography" back in September 2006. Unfortunately, our camera then didn't really have the feature required to make it easy to use this technique. This Christmas, Dayna and I decided to get ourselves a new camera as our "big gift" -- the Canon S5 IS. It has the crucial feature called "automatic exposure bracketing" (AEB) that allows one to take a series of photos at different exposure levels. Afterwards, you can run the photos through a software and create an end result that looks like this:

The above is a shot of the front of our house. Compare that to the "point-and-shoot" version below:

Check out these other amazing photos on Flickr here:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/realhdr/pool/

TAGGED

I was tagged by Rachel

The rules of the game:

• Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.

• Share 7 random and/or weird facts about yourself on your blog, as we all want to know them.

• Tag 7 random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.

• Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

7 Random Things About ME:

1. I am an identical twin
2. I used to play the trombone
3. I have spent at least one night in 315 cities in 11 countries
4. I worked at starbucks
5. I owned 2 volkswagen rabbits
6. I've been blogging since 2004 (is that random?)
7. I'm a "secret shopper" (rate customer service etc)

I am tagging:
Dunn
Sheryl
Stacey
Stephen
Tim K
Keri
Kori

Pre-spring Clean-up

Oh the joy of basement renos! It forces us to have a pre-spring clean-up. As Dayna had said before, I am amazed at some of the stuff that I still have... does that qualify me as a pack rat? Anyhow, when I was in high school in Hong Kong, we have physical education classes; but unlike it here in Canada, we have uniforms for those classes... and here it is:


As you can imagine, having phys-ed classes in 30°C+ weather would make for a very sweaty t-shirt after class. Packing it around for another half-a-day in our small yet fashionable backpacks would go against our teenager instinct to attract the opposite sex. Being a bunch of rascals that we were, we would wash our uniform in the bathroom before packing it; but that presents another problem: mixing of moisture and hand-written assignments (remember, this was in the 80's). As such, we came up with an ingenious solution of pinning up our shirts on the bulletin board in the back of the classroom, so that they will dry before we pack them in our bags. You can see in this picture some of the pin holes on the shoulder of the shirt.


In any case, in the same pile of old clothings, I also found the shirt of my scout uniform (my stories in Hong Kong seemed to revolve around uniforms). Unfortunately, I don't think I have my necker (Scout scarf) anymore.

I wasn't a very accomplished scout, evidenced by the scarcely decorated left sleeve. On the right-sleeve, the middle is the "Hong Kong Island East" district badge. The top badge is the "40th Group" badge. This particular group will be somewhat historic as "St. Margaret's College"does not exist anymore because the Catholic school board had decided to close down the school and the building has been demolished. When Dayna and I went to Hong Kong back in March/April 2006, I missed the reunion held there by a mere few days.

At any rate, that's it for now. I am sure we will find more interesting things as we dig through our boxes.